Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar
by SonicAnime2010
Summary: Almost having your home destroyed can really stress you out. A (almost) 9 year old Sonic knows that well, and has decided to take a vacation. Little does he know that his path is about to cross with a 9 year old Nanoha Takamachi, who is looking for her own place in life. Their destinies linked one faithful night. (Genesis Sonic timeline; Original Series/MOVIE the 1ST Nanoha)
1. Chapter 1

SonicANIME2010 here with the debut of my new story; now before I go into this, I'll clear a few things up... For one, this is another Sonic and Nanoha crossover, I just can't get enough of these two and I'm a big fan of both series. 2nd, this is another AU things, not related to the other crossovers by canon. As far as timeline is concerned, this is well in the Genesis days of Sonic, to put it in perspective, after Sonic 1, before Sonic 2, so Tails hasn't been introduced yet. As far as the Nanoha series, this is straight through the original, first season, so fair warning, there may be a bit more of a darkish theme. Without further ado, let it begin. Oh and I don't own any of the canon characters mentioned here, they belong to their respective companies

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City]<br>[7:30 am]  
>[BGM: "The Promise" Final Fantasy XIII]<strong>

"We are now entering our destination port of Uminari City; please make sure your belongings are secure" a tomboyish female voice spoke over the intercom, waking the 6 teenage human passengers; 4 female and 2 male, inside. The only non-human passenger was a young, anthropomorphic blue hedgehog. The blue of his fur covered his legs and head, but not his arms, belly or muzzle, those were all peach-furred. He was much shorter than the humans and looked a little bit chubby, but not overly so; clad in only a pair of white gloves, red shoes with a white stripe and golden buckle, and a small little red scarf along his collar. Though, despite his odd appearance, the other humans didn't really seem to mind. It did help that he didn't cause any trouble. In fact he tried to sleep the whole boat trip to Uminari, but the announcement put an end to that.

'_So much for Sonic the Hedgehog sleeping the whole way, now I have to face these humans,' _The 9-year old hedgehog, newly identified as Sonic, opened his green eyes and stood up from his seat, taking a moment to adjust his scarf a bit then carefully watching the six humans who were also in the cab of the ship he was on, _'I'd like to think that these guys aren't as bad as Eggman, but then again that's my naïve side thinking.'_

To the other humans, the hedgehog appeared to be nervous and awkward. Though most of them could understand such feelings; after all, if they were to put themselves in his shoes, they'd be probably feeling the same thing. The humans were then given a rather humorous display of the poor guy getting tripped to the ground due to the ship making a sudden stop into the harbor port.

'_Ugh! This is why I prefer the land.' _Sonic mentally groaned and slowly stood up, though his wobbly attempt in doing so and his struggle to maintain his balance caused the girls inside to giggle at the cute display. Sonic caught that and let out a chuckle himself to cover his embarrassment, "Uh… I meant to do that!"

There was a little bit of a pause after the hedgehog spoke, and that caused him to get nervous. Sonic thought in his mind that he made a big mistake in revealing that he could talk. He let out small and soft nervous whine, which cued the other humans, who were staring at him, in as to how young he was. To his surprise, the humans didn't say a word; instead, the girls giggled at him again while the two boys had looks of amusement on their faces.

"E-eh?" Sonic blinked, nervously staring at their reactions, but before he, or anyone else for that matter could say anything else; the captain's voice spoke over the intercom.

"Alright everyone, we've finished docking, you are all free to disembark" the captain declared, "Thank you for choosing the Syldra round trip touring service, your one and only ticket to see the beautiful South Island archipelago. I am Faris and I was proud to be your captain, I hope to see you all again soon."

The humans disembarked from the ship, giving their purple-haired captain a friendly wave on their way out. Sonic had attempted to slip out through the crowd too, but was easily caught by the ever-so-observant and experienced captain.

"Ah ah ah... not so fast there" the woman lightly tugged the hedgehog aside by the arm, "I want a word with you"

"E-eh? Why?" Sonic asked, futilely struggling to rush off, "I paid my fare didn't I?"

"In exact change" the captain added, "But that's not the issue..."

"You want to know why I left the island..." the hedgehog lowered his head, "Is that right?"

"Smart little guy too" Faris nodded, "You're the first of your kind to leave the islands to come here. I know that because I'm the only captain brave enough to take my boat over there. Everyone else has been trying to stay away since…"

"Eggman…" the blue hedgehog tightened his fists at the mere thought of the name, "He almost ruined my home, and I want to take a break from it all."

"Yeah, it's idiots like him that give us humans a bad name," Faris held her fist up, "You should know, not all humans are as bad as him."

"I hope you're right" the hedgehog didn't seem so confident.

"How about this, my next tour is set for a week from now" the captain offered, "That should give you plenty of time to take a vacation and observe the people of this city, and if you don't like it, I'll give you a free ride back. Got it?"

"Hai" Sonic nodded, "I'll do my best, thanks for your help."

"Don't mention it" the captain nudged the hedgehog off her boat, "Now get going, and don't come back until next week!"

"Yes ma'am!" the blue hedgehog nodded quickly and sped off to the top of the nearest building, _'She doesn't seem so bad, and maybe she's right. Not all humans are like Eggman. Well, I have a vacation, might as well get it going with a blast!'_

Sonic the Hedgehog: The Lyrical Familiar, is about to begin

* * *

><p><strong>[Opening: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 1<br>it was a meeting of chance that changed it all**

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City: Midori-ya café]<br>[BGM: "The Yachas Massif" Final Fantasy XIII]**

To the 9-year-old Takamachi Nanoha, it was the start of any other day; wake up early, style her reddish brown hair in her usual twin-pigtails and get dressed in the long, white dress uniform that was the girls uniform for Seishou Elementary School; and go down and greet her family for breakfast.

"Ohayo, okaa-san, otoo-san," the girl greeted her mother and father as she entered the kitchen.

"Ohayo" Shiro, Nanoha's father returned the greeting with a warm grin

"Ohayo, Nanoha-chan" Momoko, her mother greeted Nanoha casually with a soft smile, "Breakfast is on the table."

"Arigatou" Nanoha said as she sat down at the table, "Itadakimasu"

"Did you do your homework?" her father asked, looking up from his newspaper.

"Hai" the young girl pulled out her backpack, "Everything's all done and ready to be turned in"

"You did it all, including your cram school?" Shirou asked in some disbelief, "That's a lot of work to do all at once."

"Nyahaha..." Nanoha giggled, "I sort of got tunnel vision when I started, so it was hard for me to take a break."

"You're a hardworking girl, just don't push yourself too hard" Momoko half-complimented/half-warned her daughter, "Oh, Kyouya and Miyuki took their breakfast to the dojo again to practice, in case you're wondering."

"Hai" Nanoha nodded, finished her breakfast and looked up at the clock, which read 7:35. In her surprise she quickly finished her breakfast and put her shoes on. Before she left she called back to her parents, "Ittekimasu (I'm going now, common Japanese greeting for the situation)"

"Itterasshai (translation "please go and come back" but again, common for situation)" Shiro called back, sighing as he watched his youngest daughter leave for school, "You're right about her being hardworking. It makes me worry that she could be working too hard. She ever tell you why?"

"Iie.. And neither her cram school teachers nor her elementary school teachers have been able to get an answer from her on that either." Momoko shook her head, "I don't know what drives her, but I just hope it doesn't get her hurt."

* * *

><p><strong>[Seishou Elementary School]<br>[BGM: "Plains of Eternity" Final Fantasy XIII-2]**

The bus to the coed elementary school came to a park just in time for the students on board to head into the building. Three students in particular included the average friendly Nanoha Takamachi and her two multimillionaire heiresses that were her best friends: the dirty-blonde, outspoken Anglophone Alisa Bannings; and the gentle and kind Suzuka Tsukimura. Though her friends would probably say and tell her otherwise, Nanoha often felt like a third wheel to them in comparison.

"Did you hear? Apparently after his base on South Island was destroyed, Doctor Eggman went off the radar. Like he disappeared and nobody's seen him since." Alisa asked the two, "Hard to believe that a formerly well-respected scientist in the field of robotics and technology could all of a sudden go crazy and start kidnapping innocent animals and do terrible things to them."

"It's been barely a week since we heard his "declaration" that he was going to conquer the world..." Suzuka added, "Something about powerful gems too..."

"What makes me curious is how his base was destroyed in the first place" Nanoha noted, "and it looked strong… Still I feel sorry for the ones who lived on South Island during that..."

"I just hope they aren't hurt. I've heard about how beautiful the islands are" Suzuka added, "Ever since I heard about them, I've been trying to convince my family to take one of the tours, but after hearing the bad news in the past week, I think they'll be more concerned for our safety."

Both Nanoha and Alisa nodded in agreement. The school bell cut their conversation short and the girls went into the classroom to start their school day.

* * *

><p><strong>[Lunch-time]<br>[No BGM]**

The first place Sonic visited in his little "tour" around the city took him to the elementary school, a place where young humans went to learn things about the world, not unlike the schooling on South Island. On a nearby rooftop, the blue hedgehog stood; making sure that he wouldn't be spotted and at the same time watching over the young humans as they enjoyed their lunch.

'_Well these ones don't seem too bad'_ Sonic mentally observed; suddenly he found his attention grabbed by a particular trio of human 9-year old girls who were about to enjoy their lunch on the same bench. Out of the three, the one who grabbed his attention the most with the girl with the brown-ish hair and blue eyes that had a slight purple tint to them, _'Huh? Who is this? Why do I suddenly feel this tug? Like I'm drawn to her…'_

"Erg... gotta get out of here before I reveal myself!" The blue hedgehog disappeared in a flash of blue that was his speed. In the back of his mind, the image of that 9 year old girl made an impression, but the reasons were still unknown.

Meanwhile, the middle of the school day finds Nanoha, Alisa and Suzuka eating their bento lunches on the school's rooftop, a somewhat popular place to eat due to the peaceful atmosphere. One of the topics discussed in class was about the future and the jobs they wish to go into, which got Nanoha to ask the first question in their conversation.

"Alisa-chan, Suzuka-chan, you two already have decided what your futures are going to be" Nanoha asked the two curiously, "Ne?"

"Well my parents are company managers" Alisa answered, "So I'm working hard to succeed them when I grow up."

"And I have an interest in machines, so it'd probably be engineering for me." Suzuka added, "What about you, Nanoha-chan? Your family runs a café, so it'd be natural for you to take over it when you grow up."

"Hai... it seems that way, but...I feel like there's something else I want to do... I'm not sure I can see it clearly yet though." Nanoha nodded, and without her expression so much as showing it, she criticized herself, "I have no special skills or strong points about me either…"

**[BGM: "Miscasting" Nanoha A's OST]**

"BAKA!" Alisa's outburst caused Nanoha to turn her head to face her, only to close her left eye as the girl had thrown a slice of lime at her cheek. The dirty-blonde girl looked outright upset at what Nanoha had said, "You shouldn't be saying that about yourself!"

"That's right, I'm sure there's something only you can do" Suzuka's soft and encouraging tone voiced her agreement to what Alisa had said.

"Furthermore, aren't your grades better than mine?!" Alisa went further and pointed her finger at the girl in emphasis, making Nanoha inch her head slightly away. The outspoken girl looked like she was about ready to pounce on her friend, "And if you say that you have no strong points, what's that say about me, huh?!"

Sure enough, to the surprise of Suzuka, Alisa pounced on Nanoha and drove her to the ground. She then got behind the poor girl and stretched her face to rather comical levels. This display started to draw a bit of a crowd from the other students who chose to have their lunch on the rooftop garden area.

"But I wouldn't be good as a business administrator" Nanoha whined somehow through Alisa's humorous action, "And I wouldn't be good at normal work either…"

"E-eh, you two, you shouldn't be doing that, come on!" Suzuka tried, and failed to break the two up, "Come on, you guys!"

* * *

><p><strong>[Later]<br>[No BGM]**

Not fully able to take the image of the girl out of his mind, Sonic found himself following the trio of friends for the remainder of the day. He took care not to be spotted by them and somehow he was in the clear so far.

With only the peaceful sunset to serve as a backdrop, Nanoha, Alisa and Suzuka walked along a path on their way to the cram school they attend sometimes after elementary school.

"Something I can do…" Nanoha thought about what Suzuka had said during lunch, "Something only I can do..."

Along their way, the trio passed a teenage girl taking her dog for a nice jog. The hedgehog had the dog pegged as one of the more annoying types, so it came to no surprise, and actually some amusement to see the energetic one become annoyed.

"BE QUIET!" the girl shouted at the dog in plain English. Satisfied that she shut the yappy beast up, she turned to rejoin her friends; however a soft chuckle from the bushes to her right caused her to curiously turn towards that direction, "Huh?"

'_Uhoh! Bailing!' _Sonic ducked his head and leapt to the trees, though he narrowly avoided detection, the light-blue trail his speed left drew some curiosity to Alisa Bannings.

'_Odd... thought I saw something just now…'_ Alisa thought to herself, only to quickly realize that her friends were up ahead. In her haste she rushed forward and past them, just in time to direct them to a shortcut off the beaten path that led to their cram school, "Over here! There's a shortcut."

The girls walked through the path, however, Nanoha looked a little bit pensive and she suddenly stopped when she realized something.

'_This place…'_ The young girl suddenly thought, reflecting back on a dream of a young human boy getting fighting off some weirdly shaped creature, _'This is just like… the one in my dream..'_

"Nanoha-chan, are you alright?" Suzuka asked in concern.

"H-huh? Oh I'm fine, don't worry" Nanoha tried to assure her friends.

'_That's not "fine" something's on her mind. First I see some weird blue flash thing, now Nanoha-chan's acting strangely' _Alisa noted in her thoughts, she didn't have much time to ponder them, as cram school was about to begin soon, "Come on you two, we don't want to be late!"

Suzuka and Nanoha followed her again. However, Nanoha still had the mysterious dream on her mind. Then, to add to Nanoha's sudden confusion, she felt something on her mind and heard a young voice. Unknown to her, the voice was also heard in Sonic's mind, much to his own confusion.

'_Help me' _a male voice, no older than ten years old if that, called out to them for help.

"E-eh?" Nanoha suddenly stopped, which in turn, caused Alisa and Suzuka to stop ahead of her, "Did you two hear that?"

"No…" Suzuka shook her head, she didn't hear anything

"Me neither..." Alisa added, though her thoughts had a different opinion, _'Could this day get any weirder? First I thought I saw something blue in the bushes earlier after I told off that dog, then Nanoha-chan starts acting weird, now she's hearing voices? What is going on?!'_

Nanoha stood for a moment, trying to figure out where the voice is coming from. Suddenly, she (and Sonic, though she didn't know that), heard the voice again, and this time she was able to pinpoint where it came from.

"This way!" Nanoha suddenly rushed in another direction, with no other choice, Alisa and Suzuka followed suit. Their blue hedgehog follower had also followed via leaping from tree to tree.

In a few minutes, Nanoha arrived at the source of the voice, which was revealed to be a sleeping yellowish-tan furred ferret. The hedgehog follower, still choosing discretion and subtlety, watched as the young girl knelt in front of the ferret in concern for its wellbeing.

The ferret, as if sensing a presence above him, raised his head upward and gazed at Nanoha, somewhat half awake. When he did, the red orb-like gem tied around his neck in a pendant caught the girl's attention. Sonic watched as the girl lifted the ferret up. Just as she did, Alisa and Suzuka finally caught up to her.

The girls were caught up in a little bit of frenzy, wondering what to do about the ferret. Alisa suggested that since it was injured, they should take it to a hospital. Suzuka countered that since it was an animal, they should take it to a vet. Nanoha, on the other hand, was just confused and concerned for the ferret's safety. The mentioned ferret looked up at the girl holding him before falling asleep again.

* * *

><p><strong>[Makibara Animal Hospital]<br>[No BGM]**

Within almost ten minutes, the girls safely got the ferret to the vet. Sonic had followed suit and stood outside the office so he could listen into the conversation between the trio of grade-schoolers and the vet.

'_There's something about that ferret too…'_ Sonic mentally observed, _'I'm pretty sure that it was his voice I heard earlier, same with that girl too. But why? What is going on here?'_

Thankfully, the ferret's wounds weren't deep, but it was a bit weak according to the vet. He did wake up for a moment and stared at Nanoha in particular. Then it showed her his gratitude for help by softly licking her finger, much like any other domesticated animal would. The girls had to cut their visit short; however, otherwise they would've been late to cram school.

Sonic then came to a decision himself that as much as he'd like to figure out what his connection to the brunette was, or how he kept feeling the mental tug, there was one other issue he had to deal with: finding a place to stay for the night. The blue hedgehog gazed down at his gloved hand, looking at the small amount of yen he had left, saved up from selling some of the scrap metals from the mechs he thrashed to merchants who acted as middlemen in buying out some metals in order to resell them to other companies who could make metallic parts such as shelving units for shops.

'_Ah... the one issue I never thought I'd have to deal with this early..'_ the hedgehog mentally groaned, _'I have enough money to probably get me ONE night at a little hotel and maybe a small meal for dinner if I'm not picky… but other than that, I need to find a way to get more money fast if I'm gonna be spending a week here.'_

With a soft sigh, the hedgehog rushed off to take care of his own business, hoping it would provide enough of a distraction to keep that young human girl off his mind.

* * *

><p><strong>[Later that same night]<br>[No BGM]**

It wasn't easy, but somehow Sonic had managed to book himself a nice little hotel room and at the same time get some nice dinner to go with it. As luck would favor him, he found a little local inn that was owned by an elderly woman. The reasons for her low pricing was a little bit of a personal philosophy she followed; that one should never have to overpay for something so simple and necessary. And maybe it was just her friendly demeanor, or how anxious and nervous the blue hedgehog was, she took his money and gave him a room key without any questions asked. She even offered him some of the curry she made for dinner.

'_Well, especially after that nice old lady was kind enough to give me a room, I'd say that this counts as a decent start to a vacation.'_ The hedgehog grinned in satisfaction after he finished his dish of curry, which almost was as good as his favorite food, chili dogs. To work off such a delicious meal, Sonic had planned to stretch his legs for a bit then go out for a nice long run.

**[BGM: "Inflexible Determination" Final Fantasy X OST]**

"Huh?" the blue hedgehog paused for a moment in his stretches as he felt yet another tug on his mind, only this one was quite different, almost like someone was calling out to him versus the tug he felt earlier. With a soft sigh, he closed his eyes to focus on whom or what was calling out to him, _'now what?'_

'_Two…I sense two that can hear my voice... Please both of you, I need your help... please lend me your strength'_ the familiar male voice echoed in his mind.

**[Midori-ya Café]**

* * *

><p>Nanoha Takamachi stood right beside her bed, her eyes too were closed and focused on the voice that called out to her. Deep in the back of her mind, she too felt the tug from the other presence, but she never could tell where it came from and it was something she just had to shrug off.<p>

'_Is it the ferret that's calling me?'_ the girl questioned in her thoughts, _'If that's true, then what about the other presence? Could he be calling it too?'_

'_Please, come to where I am...'_ the young male voice pleaded again,_ 'the time we have left… the danger... It's too late!'_

The voice cut off from there, almost similar to a phone call suddenly losing connection. Nanoha sighed and laid her head on her bed for a moment or two before making her decision. Something was going on, and it involved the ferret she and her friends had found. With her mind set, she rushed off towards the vet's office.

* * *

><p><strong>[Makibara Animal Hospital]<br>[BGM: "Knight of the Goddess" Final Fantasy XIII-2 OST]**

Even with the ability to break the sound barrier without breaking a sweat, Sonic still only managed to arrive at the hospital just as Nanoha did; though she appeared to be a bit out of breath and wasn't able to spot the blue hedgehog as he hopped into a nearby tree.

All of a sudden the both of them heard an odd, screeching noise that made them cover their ears in pain from how loud the noise blasted their eardrums and further in.

'_This noise!' _The two of them gripped their heads tighter, only to release them when the noise suddenly subsided. Then they both noticed that everything stopped around them, such as the stoplights, almost like time itself had come to a complete halt.

With a shake of his head, Sonic watched as Nanoha ran in, and at the same time, the same ferret who had been calling out to them both, rush out from the hospital and straight for the tree that the blue hedgehog currently had perched himself from. The ferret wasn't alone; he was chased by what looked like a weird furry monster with distinct pinkish eyes that just oozed out a "DANGER" warning.

Fear evident in his movements, the ferret ran right up the tree. That in turn, caused the beast that was after him to follow suit, only its momentum and superior strength would cause the tree to topple down once it hit.

"Oh... of course, the ONE tree that has the blue hedgehog in it gets thrashed by the weird monster!" Sonic shouted as he jumped from the tree to the top of a nearby wall. He let out a sigh as he landed, "So much for my vacation, looks like I'm gonna have to do some fighting!"

Nanoha blinked as she noticed the blue hedgehog on the wall nearby, however, before she could say anything, her attention was shifted again to the tree that the ferret ran up. Just as the monster toppled the tree, the ferret jumped from the branch it made it too. Noticing that the ferret was heading right for her, Nanoha opened her arms up and was able to catch him just in time.

"W-what's going on?!" Nanoha asked in a mix of confusion and shock, "W-what is that thing?!"

"You came for me..." The ferret suddenly spoke to Nanoha, probably ignoring the blue hedgehog in the background.

"You spoke?!" Nanoha flailed her arms a little bit in surprise

"Yeah... way to pay attention to the blue hedgehog right here." Sonic quipped cynically to Nanoha and the ferret, though his light-hearted tone showed he wasn't serious

"Correction, you BOTH came for me..." The ferret said after a small sigh, suddenly getting the sinking feeling that he wasn't going to quite like the blue one who happened to hear him.

"Nya..ha..ha." Nanoha looked up at the hedgehog and offered a small sheepish grin

"Kidding, kidding" Sonic waved his arms in dismissal, "I quip for stress relief. Kami knows I've needed that in the past week or so."

"Eh?" Nanoha blinked, wondering what the hedgehog was referring to, _'Could he be from South Island? It would make sense with the timeline from what he said'_

'_Stress relief?'_ The ferret stared as well, _'this guy couldn't be any younger than me or her, so what could've happened that even HE would need stress relief?!'_

"Uh... as much as I'm such a nice sight to stare at" Sonic coughed to drag the two out of their staring phase, "Need I draw your attention to the tree that just got crushed?"

Sure enough, as they looked, the tree was pushed to the side and the monster itself stared right at them with a dangerous grin and glint on its expression.

"W-what is that thing?" Nanoha slowly stood up and stared at the creature in surprise.

"Uh… A giant… tentacle... furball?" Sonic voiced his observation of the monster, "Yeah, you'll have to come back to me for a quip on that"

"Something that's been chasing me" the ferret said in a soft tone, "You both seem to be of the proper nature... I'd like to ask that you lend me your strength."

"I wouldn't be here if I wasn't planning on helping out." Sonic replied, a sentiment that Nanoha had also shared.

"I come from another world in search of something" The ferret explained, "But I don't think I'll be able to handle the weight of this task alone. I know I may be an inconvenience to you both, and that neither of you even know each other, but I have to ask the help of those with the proper nature to help. I promise I'll repay you both."

"As much as I'd love some extra "pay" to live here, I can't take any payment. It's just not my thing" Sonic shook his head, though he did get into a battle stance, "But that doesn't mean I won't help. Heh... this creep won't even be a WARM UP!"

Without so much as a second thought, the blue hedgehog revved his legs and ran in place until his legs appeared to be a red finger-8 loop; his signature Super-Peel-Out, used to build up his true blue, supersonic speed. Within a matter of milliseconds, the hedgehog blast off at the speed of sound and rushed for the monster.

"S-such speed..." the ferret gawked with a look of total surprise that looked outright comical for a ferret's face.

"S-so fast!" Nanoha equally gawked, her jaw dropped open and her eyes white and circular to emphasize her shock.

* * *

><p><strong>[VS Jewel Seed Monster]<br>[BGM: "Worlds Collide" Final Fantasy XIII-2]**

In the hedgehog's mind, the fight would have gone by in a script that included, but wasn't limited to: amazing the on looking two with his amazing speed, heroically rushing the monster; curl up in his spin-dash just before impact to maximize his speed and power, and probably demolish the creep in one strike. Sadly, the movie script did not include the monster's tentacles gripping the spin-dashed hedgehog and throwing him against a nearby wall, because that was EXACTLY what the monster just did.

"Ugh-gah!" the hedgehog groaned in considerable pain as he felt the hard wall on his furred skin, "T-that's probably going to hurt in the morning..."

"Are you alright?!" Nanoha asked in concern as she watched the hedgehog slowly get up, struggling though to maintain his balance.

"He won't last much longer at this rate" the ferret said in blunt honesty as he observed, "You'll have to help him"

"S-shut up, baka-ferret!" Sonic shouted as he gritted his teeth in determination, stood upright and looked to be in some considerable amount of pain from the blow, but he did not back down, "I did not survive my home almost getting destroyed by some crazed scientist jerk just to die here!"

'_So he is from South Island…'_ Nanoha couldn't help but feel some sympathy for the guy, _'Poor guy'_

'_I'm missing something here, I just know it…'_ The ferret shook his head.

Determination filling his very core, the blue hedgehog put all that he had into his next spin-dash. He charged up so fast that particles of light could've been seen surrounding him. In a burst of speed that not only broke the sound barrier, but arguably could've put a small dent in the light barrier, the hedgehog blast forward and straight into an all-or-nothing charge against the monster.

Like a knife through butter, the hedgehog cut straight through the monster, but when he unrolled, the hedgehog just stayed there, struggling to get back on his feet. He looked completely drained from the last attack, and for good reason, as he did literally just took whatever energy he had left and put it in his last dash. It seemed, at least for a few seconds that the hedgehog had won, as the monster appeared to be on the ground after taking the spin-attack head on.

However, to everyone's surprise and horror, the monster reformed itself, almost like it didn't take any damage at all. The hedgehog noticed this, and then winced as he felt one of the monster's tentacles wrap around his leg, cutting it just enough to draw a little bit of blood.

"Eh... heh..." Sonic had a grin on his face, but it was one of the grim kinds, "This is gonna hurt..."

Unfortunately for was Sonic, his last words were more true than he wanted them to be. For the next half-minute or so, the monster drove the tentacle holding the blue hedgehog into wall after wall. There wasn't anything Sonic could do to stop it and every blow felt like he was getting crushed by a boulder. Try as he might, he couldn't hold back his grunts of pain. Then, like a child bored with its toy, the monster just dropped the limp hedgehog. There was a rather unnatural, disturbing and painful "bounce" that the hedgehog made on landing that took him about less than a foot away from where Nanoha and the ferret were.

Feeling concern for the poor hedgehog, Nanoha, still gripping onto the ferret, rushed toward his side. To her surprise and shock, not only was the hedgehog awake despite his beat up condition, he was actually chuckling about it.

"Well… that.. could've gone better" Sonic said dryly, "To recap, my legs are probably broken, definitely hurt and bleeding… same thing can be said for my arms, my vision's blurring every now and then; and I'm feeling light headed… Yup! It's official, I'm screwed"

"You're making jokes even now?" Nanoha asked, not quite sure if she should give the hedgehog the courtesy of a laugh or not.

"Why not?" if he could, Sonic would've shrugged, "If I'm gonna die because of my recklessness, I might as well have a quip or two about it."

"Actually.. there is a way for you to survive" The ferret piped up, "But, once this happens, neither of your lives will ever be the same again."

"Just tell me how…" Nanoha didn't care about any "changes" to her life. After all, her life had already been changed enough in one day, _'and I can't stand and watch him die while I'm able to do something about it.'_

"Well… I was going to tell you about this before he rushed in, but it involves magic" The ferret started to explain, then gestured with his paw to the red jewel on his collar, "Take this in your dominant hand"

Nanoha nodded and took the gem in her left hand, "It's warm…"

"Now you'll need to recite a magical code, then you'll become a mage" the ferret explained further.

"Maho? Mage?" Nanoha blinked then pointed at Sonic, "But how does this save him?"

"I was getting to that." The ferret sent her an annoyed look at the interruption, "After you become a mage, you can make him your "Familiar". And, well to put it simply, link his life to yours."

"You sure it'll work?" Nanoha asked, "I mean I don't even know incantations or any of that stuff."

"And even if she did, she'd be just wasting her time on me." Sonic let out a defeated sigh, "Because it's my impulsiveness and recklessness that has me in this situation in the first place, and to put it bluntly, if I'm too stupid to do that, I'm not worth sav-"

SLAP!

**[BGM: "Rydia's Theme" Final Fantasy IV]**

The hedgehog was cut off of his little self-criticism phase by a loud and rather painful slap on his cheek, courtesy of Nanoha. The ferret winced in phantom pain when he saw the red handprint on the cheek.

"Don't say that!" Nanoha's eyes threatened to leak tears as the girl pleaded with him, "Don't say another word! We all have our faults, and sometimes they do get us hurt, but that doesn't make us any less worth. You are worth saving, and even though I don't know you, I can't just stand here and watch you die if I can prevent it."

'_She's willing to do this for me? Why? Though she is right… I can't give up now!' _The blue hedgehog thought over what the girl said for the moment then said only one word, "Sonic"

"Eh?" the girl blinked

"My name" Sonic explained briefly, "Sonic the Hedgehog"

"Sonic, that's a nice name" Nanoha smiled in a friendly fashion in response, "My name's Takamachi Nanoha, but you can call me Nanoha. My friends call me by my name, you can be my friend too if you say my name. That's the first step to becoming friends."

"Friends, eh?" Sonic gave the concept a quick thought before flashing her his trademark smirk, thought it pained him to do so, "Why not? I'll be your friend… but first… will the talking ferret please continue his boring chat about magics and stuff?"

**[No BGM]**

"H-hai.." The ferret nodded, then cast a quick glance at the monster, only to regret it as the beast, after looking somewhat bored, began to ready itself to strike again, "I know the incantation.. so repeat after me.. I, the one who accepted this mission…"

"I, the one who accepted this mission" Nanoha repeated, then followed what the ferret said, word by word, to the red gem in her hand, "by the ancient contract, order you to release your power. As the winds fill the sky and the stars fill the heavens, so shall my heart fill with courage, and my hands with magic! Raising Heart, Set up!"

"**Alright! Standby ready!" **The gem spoke in a distinct female voice that almost sounded alive, if it weren't a device.

"Alright, now that the device is activated, try to focus your mind on some images" the ferret continued his explanation, "Focus on what will give you the power to access magic, your staff. Then what'll protect your body, like a strong armor."

"Oy, isn't that asking a bit much of her?" the peanut gallery, aka Sonic, asked.

"That's not all, in addition, you need to focus on him as well" the ferret added in reference to the seriously injured hedgehog, "Feel your magic flow into him and empower his life. Doing that will bind his life to yours as your familiar. Finally you'll need to focus on what form your familiar might take, should you wish to change that. Though you should probably try to picture him as a bodyguard of sorts, including what would he wear and wield as your familiar."

"U-um…" Nanoha tried hard to focus, but found some difficulty in really finding a "strong armor", so instead she went with the first things that came to mind. As for Sonic, she didn't want to change his overall form. She felt that it was his hedgehog form that gave him the unique flair he had. She again designed his garb and weapon the same way as her own, the first things that came to mind. The device seemed to cooperate and engulfed her, and a surprised Sonic in a flash of light.

**[Insert: "Raising Heart, Set up" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha THE MOVIE 1st OST]**

Inside the bright light, the red gem grew to almost three times its size, relatively almost, if not the same as Nanoha's fist. The gem became suspended and held in a golden-yellowish tinted near-circle that was the magic staff's head. The head extended a long, silver pole with a blue piece at the end.

When Nanoha grabbed the staff in her left hand, her clothes disappeared, but were quickly replaced by a blue and white dress, similar to her school uniform, only with a few additions. The shoulders of her dress were thicker, sort of like a jacket, and at the end of the sleeves along her arms were thick, blue wrist guards that were fastened together by a screw. Her hands had black, fingerless gloves and her shoes were white with a red gems on the feet. White bands replaced the green ones that tied her hair into her traditional pigtails look.

For Sonic, the only changes to his body were his wounds being instantly healed by the magic that flowed into him, he was still his cool blue hedgehog self. Much similar to Nanoha, Sonic too received his weapon first, only instead of the staff, he received a set of twin kodachi blades; one for each hand. The blades came to him so that in the the initial grip; his right hand would hold its sword in a normal grip, while his left hand held its respective blade in a reverse grip.

His shoes, scarf and gloves remained the same, though his wrists were given light metal arm-braces for protection in close combat, as well as to keep the second blade held in the reverse grip from accidentally cutting himself. He also gained armor similar to that of a Japanese samurai: a light, form-fitting lamellar armor for his front that provided solid protection without sacrificing any mobility. The armor was shaped in a tunic that covered most of the hedgehog's upper body and shoulders, leaving only his back, legs just below the knee and forearms bare. The armor had a white and blue color scheme along with some reddish tints to match.

The duo finished their "transformation" by posing back-to-back with their respective weapons held in full view.

* * *

><p><strong>[BGM end]<strong>

The whole transformation took a matter of around 3-5 seconds in real time. The flash, which had disoriented and kept the two out of view of the ferret and monster. The two who were affected by it all just blinked simultaneously.

"E-eh?!" Both of them let out a surprised cry at the same time.

"What's all this? The staff.. and this dress" Nanoha gazed at her outfit and staff in awe and confusion.

"I feel… alive! Even more than ever… Like a burst of energy just came and boosted me even more than I'd ever thought possible" Sonic voiced his thoughts in awe, then gazed at his swords and armor, "Snazzy looking swords and armor too! And I don't feel any of this stuff weighing me down!"

"Sugoi…" The ferret gasped in awe at the brilliant sight before him, and not only that, but the power those two were giving off were off the charts.

The moment of awe and admiring had to come to a quick end, however, as the monster roared to remind everyone that it was still there, and it still had a few targets to chase after.

"Ehhh?!" Nanoha held her new staff tightly to her in nervousness, but her new "familiar" on the other hand had a much different mindset than her.

"Yeah, yeah; we hear ya you ugly… tentacle… furball thing! Okay I still haven't thought of a clever quip for you, but I'll get one before this night's over.. Before I get to that" Sonic pointed his right hand sword at the monster then smirked as he took on a battle stance in front of his mage, "IT'S PAYBACK TIME!"

**[To be continued!]**

**[Ending: "Little Wish (Lyrical Step)" Yukari Tamura]**

**[End of Chapter 1]**

* * *

><p>Ha ha ha! How's about a CLIFFY to start my new story off, eh? Huh! Oh yeah, this is how you come back from a long hiatus! Anyways, this'll be the pilot, I'll get the next chapter going as well as my other two stories as well. I think what I'm going to do is set aside certain weeks, like one week I'll work on and update Lyrical Record and Night Sky while another week will be for Lyrical Familiar. Character designs are not exactly my forte, but I'm trying my best.. I'd like to hear some input as well on this so I can improve. But one thing's for sure, I will be able to balance this and my schoolwork out! Til then, I'll see you all in the next post.. oh and if anyone has ideas on video game arcs, I'll be taking them.. this set before Sonic 2 so doors are open.. However, I will not use original characters, I'll go as far as small shout out cameos but that's it… Oh and I left a nifty classic video game reference somewhere, can anyone find it?<p> 


	2. Chapter 2

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another new chapter to the Lyrical Familiar. Well, the debut of the pilot for this story has given me a good idea that will balance out my fanfictions, along with my schoolwork. I won't work on all 3 at once during the week. Instead I'm going to set aside weeks in which I do work.. Like one week I'll work on this one and the next I'll work on Night Sky and Lyrical Record. This should keep me from getting overwhelmed. For this chapter I will also show an opening "script" much like the ones I did in my other stories, it'll go for the opening only though as that will have more content in it. I forgot to do it on the pilot episode. Anyways, here we go, enjoy!

* * *

><p><em>Previously on Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar<em>

"_I'm Sonic, Sonic the Hedgehog, and I thought my vacation away from home would do me some good" Sonic's voice narrated, "But here I find myself drawn into a battle thanks to a talking ferret and Nanoha… I never thought that my first day away from South Island could've led to this.."_

"_My name is Nanoha Takamachi, and I used to be a regular 9 year old, 3__rd__ grade elementary school student, at least until my life was changed forever by magic." Nanoha continued, "It all started when I found the injured ferret. He called out to me for help, and I followed, not knowing what was ahead."_

"_The same night I arrived, trouble brewed" Sonic took over the narration, "I followed the call to the same animal hospital I saw Nanoha and her friends enter in. The ferret rushed over to us and pleaded for help; help from the monster hot on his tail. I tried to take the creep on all by myself…"_

"_It was painful to watch…" Nanoha continued, "Sonic was beaten by the monster; beaten to within an inch of his life."_

"_I probably should've been killed by that monster, but something kept me alive; maybe it just wasn't my time yet; or maybe it was the heart-filled plea by Nanoha" Sonic took over again, "But after that, the real magic happened."_

"_I recited an incantation that forever changed my life." Nanoha finished her part of the narration, "I felt an amazing power flow through me and Sonic.."_

"_This power… gave me new strength, and it linked our lives together." Sonic ended his own as well, "Now we have an enemy to face, and I'm itching for some payback… Little did we know that this was only the first of many battles for us."_

"_Sonic the Hedgehog: The Lyrical Familiar" Sonic and Nanoha declared at the same time, "Is about to begin."_

* * *

><p><strong>[Intro]<br>[Opening: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]**

The music begins at a slow start as Raising Heart, initially in standby form, shifts into its main staff/device form. It is then shown in Nanoha's left hand as she stood, back-to-back with Sonic. Both of them are in their respective Barrier Jackets, which were blown gently by a small breeze that added to the peaceful, bright and sunny backdrop for theme. Their eyes are closed as if in deep thought. The viewpoint catches their side profile as the duo began to open their eyes slowly, almost to the pace of the music.

Scene shift to a view of a clear blue sky of a warm, sunny day; as a yellow star logo appeared with the logo of a blue hedgehog right in the middle of it. The following text appeared in Japanese kanji/katakana and English:

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar**

Nanoha, wearing an orange skirt and brighter orange jacket outfit, is shown, sitting calmly in the grass, with her knees close to her body and her eyes closed as if in deep thought again. She felt a sudden, but gentle nudge from the tip of a small, red shoe. She looked towards the source and found Sonic, lying on the grass with his hands folded behind his head like a pillow. With a small, soft smile on her face, she lightly taps the hedgehog, waking him up; they both turn towards the invisible "camera" and while Nanoha winks cutely, Sonic had a short, confident grin.  
><strong>hiza wo kakaete heya no katasumi <strong>_("I was always so uneasy that I was shaking")_**  
>itsumo fuan de furuete ita <strong>_("hugging my knees in the corner of my room.")_**  
>"hontou" wo shiru koto ga kowakute TOBIRA wo tojita <strong>_("I was afraid of knowing the "truth" and closed the door to it.")_

The images of Sonic and Nanoha are reeled as if by an old fashioned camera in a transition to the next scene. A girl with bright yellow hair and red eyes, wearing a black long-sleeve shirt and matching skirt combination sits on a couch that sat against a window with a view overlooking the city. Lying next to the couch was a large red-furred wolf, which the girl pets with her left hand. The girl softly placed the fingertips of her right hand on her own forehead as she stared at the ceiling above her.  
><strong>yasashii uso ni ibasho wo mitsukete <strong>_("Through a kind lie, I discovered where I should be.")  
><em>**yume no naka ni nigekonda **_("I fled and took refuge in my dreams")_

Nanoha and Sonic stood side-by-side on the vast fields of green with the backdrop of a large blue lake and waterfall. The soil of the fields has a distinct checkerboard pattern to it. Nanoha held up her device as it glows a pink-ish hue, within an instant, the clothes she was wearing were replaced by her Barrier _Jacket_; while Sonic, who wasn't wearing clothes, gained his Samurai-motif Barrier Jacket as well. The duo takes to the skies and flies swiftly through the terrain.**  
>daremo shiranai kodoku no umi wo fukai ao ni someteku sabishisa kakusu<strong>_ ("No one knows of the lonely sea being dyed a deep blue color that hides my loneliness")_**  
>ichizu na omoi <strong>_("With wholehearted feelings,")_**  
>kimi no KOKORO wo kizutsukete iru <strong>_("I wounded your heart")_

The scene shifts to the blonde girl from before and Nanoha flying towards one another. The blonde wields a pole-axe with a yellow orb that shined for a brief moment before the two clashed with one another. At the same time, Sonic and the red wolf also clash with the hedgehog's twin blades meeting the wolf's claws.  
><strong>hitomi no oku no himitsu suikomaresou na <strong>_("The secret within your eyes makes me want to soak it up")  
><em>**egao no ura shinjisu ni yawaraka na ai boku ga todoke ni iku yo **_("I'll bring the truth behind your smile with a warm love")_

With a small, blue diamond-cut jewel shimmering as a brief backdrop, the scene shifts to show Nanoha's family and best friends, all smiling kindly and supportively in the general direction of the invisible "camera". The viewpoint lands back in the green area again, only showing a young, orangish-yellow furred two-tailed fox, accompanied by a pink hedgehog in a green t-shirt and orange skirt outfit.  
><strong>furetara kowaresou na nukumori ga ima kako wo hanare afuredasu <strong>_("If I touch it, the warmth that seems so breakable will break away from its past and overflow.")_

The scene shifts to show Sonic, slowly walking away in a random direction with his head hung low. He is quickly stopped by Nanoha, who grabs his hand, gives him one of the brightest and kindest smiles seen and drags him back in the opposite direction. They stop at a rooftop and gaze out at the vast city beneath them.  
><strong>zutto soba ni iru kara kanashii kage ni madowanai de <strong>_("Because you're always by my side I will no longer be puzzled over the shadow of loneliness.")_

The last scene shift shows a flurry of Sakura petals which are blown away to reveal the text and logo from before.

**Sonic the Hedgehog: The Lyrical Familiar**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 2<br>first fight together; a lyrical incantation!**

* * *

><p><strong>[Makibara Animal Hospital]<br>[Time: 8:55pm*]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

To say that Nanoha Takamachi was surprised, and maybe a little overwhelmed, would be an understatement. Given her situation though, it would be easy to understand her feelings. In a matter of minutes, she went from an "ordinary" third grade schoolgirl to a mage. With an outfit and staff that came out of nowhere, not to mention the powers that awakened with the objects. To add to that, part of the new power was also constantly channeled into the blue hedgehog to her side. The power formed what could be best described as an invisible "link".

On the opposite end of the link was Sonic, the blue hedgehog who was saved thanks to the new power. He too felt the "link" between himself and the human, and it felt just like the "tug" he felt earlier that day, only it was much stronger. Like his new "mistress", Sonic wasn't able to keep his surprised feelings suppressed, though at least he wasn't as overwhelmed.

However, the time for freaking out was short and the tentacle and fur-filled monster looked like it was about to make a move. This brought the ferret out of his amazed phase.

"It's coming!" the talking ferret warned the new mage and familiar

* * *

><p><strong>[VS Jewel Seed Monster]<br>[BGM: "World's Collide" Final Fantasy XIII-2]**

The creature took a massive leap up into the sky and rolled while in its ascension to build up the momentum. Once it got high enough it let gravity take over and fell over the duo; intent on crushing them both in a massive body slam.

Nanoha could only stare as the creature descended rapidly on her, while Sonic looked like he was about ready to pounce and take the hit for her. Before he could do that, at the last second, Nanoha held out her new staff in front of her in a desperate attempt of protection.

"_**Protection!"**_ the staff's jewel declared and just before the monster made impact, it was blocked by the sudden appearance of a pink bubble-like barrier. The barrier covered both mage and familiar and kept the monster at bay. While Nanoha had her eyes closed tight, Sonic was calm and that allowed him to watch as the monster looked like it was hurt by the barrier.

The monster suddenly burst out into tens of pieces. The sudden boom added to the pieces speed. The whole scene was littered by it, the biggest hit of damage, aside from the walls and ground, was the nearby light post, which was cut clean in half. The larger half of the post toppled and crashed into the wall it was facing.

"E-EEEH?!" Nanoha could only stare in disbelief at the amount of damage done by her barrier and the resounding effects.

"Wow!" Sonic said and whistled at his new master, "Nice mess, I'm not cleaning that up though."

"Our devices use a "programming" system that lets our magic take form." The ferret explained to the two about the magic while the monster appeared to be out of commission, "In order to make the system work, however, its user needs to provide it with their spiritual energy"

"I have a hunch that the spiritual energy is also keeping me alive, right?" Sonic asked as he came to a guess.

"Hai" the ferret nodded, "When a mage creates a familiar, they, to put it one way, "share a heart", their lives are linked. However, just because a mage creates a familiar, doesn't mean that the familiar's going to be completely loyal to them. That's why, normally, familiars are created by a contract."

"Contract?" Nanoha asked, curious about what she did in making Sonic her familiar.

"Correct; a contract that grants a familiar life to fulfill as specific task. When the task is complete, the familiar will disappear" the ferret continued his explanation.

"Wait!" Sonic interrupted him, "You're saying I'm going to disappear?!"

"If you were made a familiar as part of a contract, then yes." The ferret answered, "However, this doesn't appear to be that specific case. You were made her familiar in an act of kindness, and are not bound by any contract. So, to put it one way, you have nothing that compels you to obey your new "master"

"Technically I don't, unless I wanted t- HEADS UP!" the hedgehog was about to say something, but stopped short when he saw the monster reform into its ugly self and rushed itself at the three.

Nanoha let out a soft gasp in surprise as she watched the beast charge. Then, to her surprise, she saw the blue hedgehog step in front of her and block the monsters attack with his twin blades. Sonic, despite having no experience with swords, which was something his master noted; was able to push the monster away from him and then spin-dashed into it with his swords acting as support.

'_Even though he doesn't seem to know what he's doing, he's still trying his hardest.'_ Nanoha thought to herself as she watched Sonic fend off the monster. Determined to give him some help, she turned to the ferret, "How do I stop this thing?"

"The "thing" is called a Jewel Seed; it was born from a tremendous power; the form we are seeing it took to protect itself." The ferret explained, "To stop it, you need to seal it with your staff, returning it to its original form."

"I don't understand, but how do I do that?" Nanoha asked while Sonic, taking advantage of a brief pause, took a step back to listen in as well.

"What you did before was one of two types of magic, offensive and defensive." The ferret answered, "They are basic forms of magic you activate by thinking about them. Focus on what you want a spell to do and let the mana shape itself. Also, most of the spells you have are also available to be accessed by your familiar as well."

"So I can cast magic too is what you're saying?" Sonic asked

"Hai, but first she needs an incantation" the ferret answered

"Incantation?" Nanoha stood there, not quite as confused anymore

"Listen to your heart" the talking ferret nodded and advised, "I have no doubt that an incantation will come to you."

"And I'll keep the monster busy while you do that" Sonic nodded, then suddenly grinned as he turned to face the monster, who looked like it was about to rush for another round, "Aha! Tutorial Boss! That's its new name!"

"Tutorial Boss?" the ferret blinked, "Why are you calling it that?"

"Uh.. You're giving us a tutorial while we're fighting it?" Sonic deadpanned as he watched the aforementioned tutorial boss rush at his direction.

"Walked right into that one" the ferret hung his head in comical defeat, he then watched as the blue hedgehog familiar did not move from his spot. Curious, he inquired, "What are you doing?"

"Wait for it…" Sonic focused, trying to find something in the new "link" he had with Nanoha. Satisfied, he waited patiently for the Jewel Seed monster to close the distance between itself and him. When the monster got within the maximum striking distance, the blue hedgehog took a makeshift defensive stance with his blades, "Protection!"

Sure enough, the barrier spell appeared and did its job in not only shielding Sonic from the attack, but also kept the monster occupied for Nanoha to come up with an incantation to seal it. And it didn't take long for that either.

"Lyrical Magical!" Nanoha called out the incantation she came up with. She held up her device high into the air as the head extended in length by about 3 inches. Pink wings sprouted from near the head.

With a grin, Sonic watched as pink strips of mana surrounded the monster. The grin turned into an inquisitive and curious glance as he saw the roman numerals "XXI" appear just above the monster's eyes.

"XXI… that's 21" the hedgehog observed, "Oy! Talking-Ferret, what's with the number?"

"That's the serial number for the Jewel Seed" the talking ferret, who still hasn't revealed his name yet, answered, "The serial numbers help keep track of the seeds when they're sealed. So to seal this one, number 21, the specific number must be called out."

"Jewel Seed, serial 21, Seal!" Nanoha called out. Her device chimed in affirmation and began the sealing. More pink streams of light bombarded the monster until it couldn't handle it. Within a matter of seconds it completely disappeared in a bright flash of pink light.

"B-bright.." Sonic winced and had to cover his eyes for the moment because of how close he was to the monster prior to its sealing. When the light settled, the monster was gone, and in its place was a small blue jewel that was cut in a diamond shape. As the hedgehog was the closest, he was the first to notice, "Okay… the big bad scary monster's gone, but what the heck is this?"

"A Jewel Seed" the ferret answered, then turned to Nanoha, "Touch it with Raising Heart"

"Hai" Nanoha nodded and lightly tapped the tip of the staff to the jewel, there was a mechanical sound that came from the device before it sealed the seed inside.

"_**Receipt No. 21, sealed!"**_The device declared.

**[Boss Cleared]  
>[Jingle: "Act Clear" Sonic CD (US) version]<strong>

Nanoha blinked as her device flashed again and she found herself back in the clothes she had on before the fight. The same had also applied to Sonic, only the wounds he had suffered at the hands of the monster were still absent.

In a customary, at least to him, fashion, Sonic celebrated the victory with a pose. His right hand was closed aside from his index finger, which he wagged in his confident glory; his left foot was behind the right and tilted so that the tip of his left shoe lightly tapped against the heel of his right, and his other arm was bent.

"Um… Sonic?" Nanoha couldn't help but stare at her new familiar's antics; she had to restrain a small giggle over how cute the boy looked, "W-what are you doing?"

"Posing, it's practically required to have a catchy jingle after you beat a boss" Sonic explained as if he was talking about the weather, "Gotta have a nice pose and some cool music."

"Uh… we don't have any of that.." the ferret hung his head low again, wondering where the heck the hedgehog came from.

"Buzzkill…" Sonic deadpanned. Then, as he was about to settle down from the pose he thought so much of, a catchy theme started to play, only from the most unusual of sources.

**[BGM: "Victory fanfare" Final Fantasy VI]**

"Yeah, now THAT'S a theme!" The blue hedgehog rocked his head back-and-forth to appreciate the music. Curious enough, he took a glance at the direction of the music and was greeted by the humorous sight of his master, with her cheeks tinted red in embarrassment and her head hung low in a poor attempt to cover it, "uh.. Nanoha?"

"T-that's my cellphone.." Nanoha sighed and pulled out her cellphone to check the caller id and instantly regretted that choice, "Okaa-san!"

"Something wrong?" The ferret asked, curious about what made the girl upset

"I left home without telling my family when you called" Nanoha explained, "I kinda hoped they wouldn't notice."

"Well that didn't work out" Sonic said with a shrug, "Better answer and face the music."

"W-wait you can't te- mmmph!" The ferret tried to say something to dissuade the girl but found his mouth pinched shut by two gloved fingers.

"No no no! Bad ferret! Bad!" Sonic half-teasingly, half-serious scolded the talking ferret, who still has yet to introduce himself to the two, "You no give bad advice. If there are more of these "jewel seed" things… then odds are this isn't our last battle, and we're gonna need to be prepared; ne, Nanoha?"

"H-hai.." the girl sighed as she opened her phone; she had the sinking feeling that the arguments between Sonic and the ferret would become a bit of a running gag; she tapped a button and accepted the call, "moshi moshi?"

**[No BGM]**

While Nanoha was busy with her phone call, Sonic and the ferret got into another argument of how much of the incident they should tell her friends and family. Both had valid, yet conflicting points. Sonic argued that there would be no way to keep the incident secret, while the ferret argued that her family weren't involved and shouldn't be put into unnecessary danger. Their argument was short-lived; however, as Nanoha hung up her phone with a tired sigh.

"I told them that a lot has happened and that I'll explain tomorrow" the girl informed the two, then slowly started the long trek back to her home, "What are you two going to do?"

"I'm following you" the ferret answered, "I don't have anywhere to stay for the moment"

"I have a hotel room, but it's halfway across the city at least; and I'm still a bit winded from that fight" the hedgehog also let out a tired sigh, "So, you're stuck with me too"

With everything all decided, the trio left the scene of the incident; the damage from the battle would last for quite some time, but thankfully nobody innocent was injured.

* * *

><p><strong>[Midori-ya Café]<br>[No BGM]**

It took them approximately twenty minutes, but Nanoha, with Sonic and the talking ferret in tow, managed to arrive at her home safely. Her family patiently waited up for them in concern and it came to a surprise to find that Nanoha wasn't alone.

"I'm home" Nanoha announced after a tired yawn; she looked like she could've fallen asleep on the spot, but somehow she stayed awake, "Sorry for worrying you guys."

"Nanoha-chan, are you alright?" Momoko asked in concern; and noticed the others with her as well, though her concern of her daugther's wellbeing, for the moment, overruled the urges she had of geeking out over the sure cuteness of the ferret and hedgehog, "You look worn out,"

"Nya..ha.. it's a long story" the girl let out another yawn as she started to wobble in place, "So.. tired"

"Well you better get to bed before you collapse" Miyuki, Nanoha's older sister, said as she urged the girl upstairs to her bedroom.

While Nanoha was ushered to her room to turn in for the night, the rest of her family turned their gaze to the blue hedgehog and talking ferret who accompanied her. Their concerned expressions asked the un-needed question about the need to explain the situation.

"Heh heh.. I'm just as worn out as her" the blue hedgehog waved his arms defensively, "You want answers, talk to the ferret."

"I guess this can't be avoided now…" the ferret sighed in defeat, he knew he had a lot of explaining to do; but wasn't quite ready, "Could this wait until tomorrow morning? A lot has happened and I need some time to figure out how to explain it."

"Hai" Shiro nodded in agreement. If he was surprised by the talking animals, he didn't show it behind his calm demeanor. Though the safety of his daughter may have played a hand in his thoughts as well, "You can use the couch if you wish."

"Arigatou-gozaimasu" the ferret nodded his head in a polite gesture and walked over to the mentioned couch.

With the ferret's sleeping situation taken care of in the form of a small basket on part of the living room's couch; the attention was then shifted to the other uninvited and weary guest, Sonic.

"Uh..." the poor blue hedgehog made a soft gulp noise in nervousness.

"You can take the couch as well" Momoko, as if noticing the hedgehog's nerves, displayed a calm and caring tone, "You look like you've had better days too. And it wouldn't be right if we didn't extend a hand of gratitude after you returned our daughter home safely."

"Thank you" Sonic, finding his spirit lifted thanks to the Takamachi family, bowed in gratitude. He muttered, but not quietly enough to not be heard, "If anything she saved me…"

Shiro and Momoko caught what he said, but, in respect to the situation and conditions, decided to refrain from asking for the time being. With everything all said and done, the night ended rather peacefully.

* * *

><p><strong>[That morning]<br>[No BGM]  
>[7:00 am]<strong>

After a nice, peaceful and refreshing slumber, Nanoha woke up with a bright smile on her face. To her, the events that happened last night could've been a dream she had while she slept. Maybe she thought of that as she prepared to get ready for school, but she was in for a rude awakening if she followed that mindset.

"Ohay-.. E-eh?!" Nanoha stopped her greeting short as she walked into the kitchen and was greeted by a humorous scene of the blue hedgehog and talking ferret from last night in the middle of another argument. A glance toward the kitchen and dining table also alerted her to not only her family wide awake and observing the argument; but, in addition, there were two surprise visitors.

"Alisa-chan?! Suzuka-chan?!" Nanoha called to her friends as she joined them and her family in observing the quarrelling duo.

"Ohayo, Nanoha-chan!" Alisa grinned and, deciding to tease her friend a bit, "Aren't you impatient, taking the ferret home early?"

"We didn't know it could talk either" Suzuka added, though she did so honestly and not in a teasing fashion.

"What are you doing here?" Nanoha asked, quite confused as to why the two would come to her house so early in the morning

"Well… Alisa-chan called me last night after you texted us about the ferret we found" Suzuka explained briefly, "She said that she thought there were a lot of weird things that happened after school."

"And I wanted to make sure you were alright" Alisa added, "Plus, we heard that something happened at the vet we went to yesterday; the reports said it was a car crash or something, "

"I think I'm okay.." Nanoha shook her head with a sigh, and then noticed that the hedgehog and ferret were still arguing, "How long have they been doing this?"

"About an hour" Momoko answered, "They were arguing over some trivial matters until Alisa-chan and Suzuka-chan arrived, then they were arguing over how much we should be told of something. I lost track from there. Now it's something about music."

"I like the blue one," Alisa grinned, "Sonic; he's cute and funny."

'_I'm not surprised. They're both sassy'_ Nanoha thought to herself as an anime-style sweatdrop appeared on her forehead in exasperation. She then asked a valid and logical question, "Aren't you surprised that they can talk in the first place?"

"We were at first" Suzuka answered, "But we got over that after their arguments got comical."

"I'm being honest here. We really need some victory jingle or something to play when we do another of those sealing things." Sonic argued with the ferret

"No we don't! This is a serious matter!" the ferret argued back, "And half of the time you were fighting the thing, you were trying to come up with a joke?"

"Hey! Expository banter is a must in a boss fight" The blue hedgehog stated in such a know-it-all fashion. He stopped when he noticed the ferret sigh and fall silent.

**[BGM: "Prelude" Final Fantasy (the crystal themes.. pick a game for this one, most are the same)]**

"I shouldn't be arguing with you, not after what you went through. I'm sorry that you had to get involved." The ferret hung his head low, unwilling to continue the argument and remembering what happened before the fight, "You might still be living on your own power otherwise."

"Ugh… not this again… that was the first thing you said to me when we woke up this morning. You called for help and we answered" Sonic said in reference to him and Nanoha, "When someone calls for help, I don't look the other way. It's just not my thing."

"Even so…" the ferret let out another sigh.

"Sonic's right!" Nanoha interrupted the two, "When you called, we came. We chose to get involved. It would be nice if we knew what we were getting involved in."

"But.." the ferret was about to point out the others in the room, Nanoha's friends and family, who were not involved; but he was shot down by a dirty look courtesy of not only the blue hedgehog, but his "master" too, "Alright… It's a long story though."

"If you're worried about the girls getting to their school on time, don't." Sonic stopped the ferret on that one, "I know where it is, and with my speed, I can get them there in seconds."

"I'm not worried about that." The ferret shook his head, then took to a mental communication, _'You're a mage now Nanoha. And you, Sonic, are her familiar. As such we can talk like this so long as Nanoha has Raising Heart with her. Try to talk with your heart.'_

'_Like this?' _The duo tested and asked as such.

'_Great!'_ the ferret had a small smile, _'You two can also communicate to each other directly as well through this method. I believe we call this "mindspeak". Most mages have the capability'_

'_Alright, but don't think this lets you escape from fessing up to everyone here'_ Sonic gave the ferret a cold look, _'We're not leaving until you explain.'_

"Alright" the ferret sighed again in defeat, he'd much rather only have to tell the affected duo, but the situation did not allow for that, "Well…I suppose I should start with who I am and what I do. My name is Yuuno Scrya; Scrya's my family name, and Yuuno's my given name. I'm from another world."

"Why did you come here?" Shiro asked, somewhat the most unfazed by the "alien" ferret.

"To find these relics called "Jewel Seeds". Originally, they were thought to be magic stones that could grant wishes" Yuuno began explaining about his purpose, "But…"

"Sometimes they go berserk?" Sonic finished the thought. Having a few of his own that he accidentally shared with Nanoha via mindspeak, _"Almost like the Chaos Emeralds."_

'_Eh? Chaos Emeralds?' _Nanoha suddenly blinked, drawing a look or two from everyone other than the blue hedgehog, "U-uh.. nothing…'

"Hai, and they'll sometimes take monstrous forms such as this" Yuuno, oblivious to Nanoha's brief moment of surprise and in his right hand, showed a display of footage taken from the fight with the previous night's Jewel Seed monster, including Sonic's defeat, much to the shock of everyone else, "They are very dangerous."

"Oh you should see the full highlight. I get better" Sonic shrugged their surprise off, "right, Yuuno the Tutorial Ferret?"

"Right.." Yuuno sighed; he just can't seem to catch a break from the hedgehog. He continued the footage feed up through Sonic and Nanoha's familiar and mage transformations, though for them both, it wasn't so much of a transform as it was a change of attire.

"_Sonic-kun?"_ Nanoha reached out to the hedgehog via mindspeak while Yuuno was busy explaining the stuff he went through with them last night.

"_What's up?"_

"_I'm sorry for intruding, but what are these Chaos Emeralds you mentioned?"_

"_You overheard that, ne?" _If he could voice it, Sonic would've sighed, _"Guess I can't keep it under wraps for too long. In South Island there are these gems known as the Chaos Emeralds; said to be relics of some past. Word is, the one who collects them all gains enormous power."_

"_How many are there?"_

"_Six… I've seen six of them on my adventure" _Sonic's face took on a pensive expression, _"I've heard rumors of a seventh, but, none of that's been confirmed."_

"_You know, you didn't have to tell me that" _Nanoha noted, _"I mean, I understand that after what Doctor Eggman did to your home, you would be mistrusting of us humans.."_

"_To tell you the truth, even I don't know why I'm telling you this…" _Sonic didn't deny Nanoha's assumption

"_Excuse me" _Yuuno suddenly interrupted the two, _"But I'm going to go over what I haven't told you two during last night's battle, and I'd appreciate if you'd pay attention."_

"It's my fault that these seeds are on this world in the first place" the ferret lowered his head as he continued, "In my home world, I'm an archaeologist. One day, I discovered something odd in an old rock formation. I sent a team down to retrieve it for safekeeping, but their ship never made it back. An accident that happened on the ship led to a big disaster. 21 of the Jewel Seeds were spread across your world because of it."

"Uh… hate to bring logic into this whole thing" Sonic interjected with his opinion, "But if the whole thing happened because of an accident, then I don't see anything that can be considered your fault."

"I was the one who found the seeds" Yuuno countered, "It's up to me to bring all of them back safely."

"Is that all?" Shiro asked, again with a calm expression; nothing seems to faze Nanoha's father too easily.

"Hai… I've explained all that I can and everything about our magic" Yuuno nodded, "I know it will be an inconvenience, but I'd like to ask for Nanoha's assistance in this. She's already gotten involved, and I'm too weak to handle this on my own."

"This isn't our decision to make, Yuuno-kun. It's up to Nanoha-chan to decide if she wants to help you or not." Momoko said, surprising Yuuno and Sonic with her moment of wisdom, "We'll support her all the way."

"But, what about her familiar?" the ferret asked, "Like I explained, he's living off the magical energy that she has…"

"From what we saw, she did that because she wanted to help him out, so we're fine with that." Shiro noted, "But, if he's going to protect her like most of these "familiars" do, then he'll need to be trained. I may be a few years out of practice, but even I can tell that his sword skills need improvement."

"Yeah, thanks for the vote of confidence" Sonic deadpanned, "Sadly, it's true. I don't know the first thing about swords."

"I do" Kyouya noted and gestured to his sister Miyuki, "We train in the dojo almost every day."

"We could teach you our style." Miyuki added, "The "Godly Twin Kodachi Style"; the blades you got when Nanoha-chan made you her familiar are the same model as our own. Odd coincidence, ne?"

"Nyahaha… I've been caught" Nanoha giggled a bit, "Yuuno-kun told me to picture how I'd like my Familiar to be and I thought specifically of bodyguards like the jobs Onii-chan and Onee-chan have; that's where I got the weapon ideas from."

"I'm not surprised that you were aware of that." Kyouya said, thinking back to the last protection detail he and Miyuki went on. _'Now that I think about it, it's been awhile since I last saw her. Wonder how she's doing.'_

"Anyways, like I was saying, I think we can teach Sonic-kun the style we practice. It'll at least help him out more when he uses his swords, but, before that" Miyuki gave the blue hedgehog a stern look, "I want you to make a promise that you'll protect Nanoha-chan."

"E-eh?!" Nanoha stared at her older sister, "B-but, onee-chan, he-"

"Sure! I'll take that promise" the hedgehog cut her off from the argument, "As long as I live, I won't let her come to harm"

"Sonic-kun?!" Nanoha turned her surprised gaze on the hedgehog, and quickly took to the mindspeak, _"Why?! You don't have to."_

"You sure about that" Kyouya asked, "I should warn you now that our training is not going to be easy, and you will get hurt along the way."

"I'm not afraid of danger, and I don't care how much I get hurt. I promise I will protect her." Sonic answered, his determination obvious in the expression he had, "I told myself coming here that not all of you humans are like Doctor Eggman, and I'd like to think that is true. I don't think I can do that on my own. After what happened last night, when Nanoha saved my life by making me her familiar, I got to thinking that she will be the one who can help me. Help me believe what I've been trying to believe about humans. Because of that, I'll protect her… with everything I got"

"Good, then you can start your training with us after you take my sister and her friends to school" Kyouya had a teasing smirk on his face as he took notice of the time, "They wouldn't want to be late, now would they?"

"E-EH!? Nanoha, Alisa and Suzuka stared at the clock and panicked, "It's almost that time already?!"

"Heh heh.. no worries" the blue hedgehog smirked in confidence as he, in a display of his natural strength, grabbed Nanoha and set her in a position where she could lock her hands around his neck. He then grabbed a surprised Alisa and Suzuka by their arms.

"Hoeeee?!" The trio screamed in surprise as they watched Sonic run in place again until his feet took on the familiar figure-8 loop shape.

"All aboard the Sonic express!" Sonic grinned more as readied his Super-Peel-Out for a huge launch, "Ready…. Here we GO!"

As soon as he said "Go!" the hedgehog was off in a huge burst of acceleration. If there was any doubt that Sonic the Hedgehog had a side for showing off, it was stamped away when he showed off his trademarked speed."

"Well" Shiro said as he stood up, "I gotta get the café opened up"

"And we have to set up the dojo" Miyuki added as she and Kyouya stood up and also left the room. The only ones left in were Yuuno and Momoko.

"Eh?" the ferret blinked, then paled when he looked up and saw the dangerous glint in Momoko Takamachi's eyes. The downside to his ferret form; Yuuno gulped a bit in comical fear, "Uh oh.."

* * *

><p><strong>[Elsewhere]<strong>

A bright and brief glimmer of light shined from the top steps of a local shrine in Uminari City. Nothing happened though after the light died down, so it was easy to push it aside. However, it was anything but forgettable.

A diamond cut jewel had made a hole for itself in the trees nearby and seemed to wait, as if looking for something to possess and give it power. The seed wasn't active yet, but it was only a matter of time before someone, maybe an unsuspecting teenager out taking her dog for a walk, to come along and give the seed a solid form to possess.

**[To be continued]**

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step~" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 2]<strong>

Author's notes: Taking a bit of a different route as far as the Nanoha series is concerned. The reasons I have it so Nanoha's friends and Family are not left out of the loop with the magic is concerned is because it would be tough for her to keep something this big and lie about it to them. Thus, I decided to enforce the issue… Plus, Sonic will definitely need all the training he can get. And as for the reactions from Nanoha's family; consider that they are very open-minded and understanding. Believe me, even I was surprised at how much this was true.

By the way, on one of the time stamps during the jewel seed monster fight, I put an asterisk by the specific time. I did that because technically the time around the area was warped. It's a nifty spell Yuuno has that can set up a barrier within a designated area, time within that area is somewhat warped, and its done so innocent people don't get caught in a crossfire. But, as noted, and pointed out by Alisa, any damage done to the ground or walls within that area would still be present. Nobody said a mage's job wasn't destructive.

Anyways, please leave a review, I'd like to see on where I can improve, and overall opinions really help too. Until then, I'm gone.


	3. Chapter 3

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in the third chapter to Sonic: Lyrical Familiar. Well, so far I've been liking how this story's started; got some good action, serious parts, and who can forget Sonic's wit? Well anyways, in case anyone hasn't noticed, this story's going to cover the Nanoha arc from the beginning.. So if there's a lack of familiarity from the Sonic fanbase; it's kinda by design and so far, Sonic's the only one present. Eggman's been referenced, but that hasn't appeared.. and yes; this is the young/classic Sonic (specifically CD) in the series, but I still use Eggman; NOT Robotnik! And don't be trying to correct me with something like "oh this is classic Sonic so it should be Robotnik or Robuttnik". Wrong! That's the Fleetway/Americanized continuity. I am NOT following that version. In the Japanese version he's always been Eggman. I'm choosing to follow that version; also in which there's no mention of a specific home world, so it can be speculated that the worlds in the crossover are the same; none of that "Mobius" stuff. To make it clear again, this is young Sonic, but from the Japanese continuity. That closes my rant, now back to the story. Any canon characters belong to their respective companies and not to me. Everyone probably knows that by now, but my legal team of vampires and their robotic maids tell me I have to say it anyways. Here we go!

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Seishou Elementary School]  
>[Time: 8:15 am]<br>[BGM: "Luca" Final Fantasy X]**

True to Sonic's word, the blue hedgehog got the trio of Nanoha, Suzuka and Alisa to their elementary school safely; and with some time to spare too. While it can't be said that the three elementary third graders didn't take their first time riding at speeds near Mach one too well; at least none of them got sick. They did have to stand for a moment to fight off a spell of dizziness from the whole trip from the initial acceleration to the final stop.

"Sugoi, Sonic-kun..." Nanoha breathed out in awe, while she had seen a decent sample of her familiar's speed last night, to experience it in person was another thing entirely, "You really are fast."

"Of course" the young blue hedgehog smirked a bit in pride and, in an attempt of coolness, though it appeared more cute than cool, wagged his right finger, "Fastest thing in South Island"

"I have a question" Suzuka said after she was able to establish a standing equilibrium with the ground, "How'd you know where the school was?"

"It was actually the first place I found when I got here" Sonic shrugged, "Wasn't easy, this city's big, and I think I got here at around the lunch period"

"And how could you tell?" Alisa sent a bit of a suspicious look at the hedgehog, who almost jumped in surprise and nerves, "Hmmm?"

"Well... um..." Sonic nervously pat the back of his head, "I could um... see kids eating lunch on the rooftop..."

"And you saw us too" Alisa added with a bit of a knowing smirk that further got to Sonic's nerves, "Ne?"

"M-maybe..." the hedgehog's nervous expression was becoming more obvious, _'She d-didn't see me, did she?!'_

"You did see us… and you followed us after school too." The dirty-blonde girl had a victorious expression on her face as she continued to stare down the hedgehog, who was a bit shorter than her in comparison, "And don't try to deny it, I saw you through the bushes on that shortcut we took to Cram School."

"B-busted…" the young blue hedgehog realized he was caught. The cracks of the ground must have looked awfully interesting to study, because that's where Sonic stared in attempt to avoid their gazes, "You got me… I was following you three yesterday."

"Why?" Nanoha asked in concern when she noticed the hedgehog look glum. Her concern was turned to surprise when she saw a small, gloved finger point directly at her, "M-me?!"

"Nanoha-chan?" even Alisa was shocked, and even more so when she saw the boy hedgehog nod his head softly. Though she was quick to recover from her shock and ask her next question, "It's not a crush, is it?"

"N-no! Nothing like that!" Sonic vigorously shook his head in denial and shot down that theory, and tried his best to explain why, "I d-don't know how to explain this, but when I saw her yesterday, I suddenly felt some tug-thing in the back of my head. A-and I wanted to follow her until I figured out what that feeling was. I was hoping I wouldn't get caught."

"Well you got caught" Alisa scolded him, "That kind of stuff gets you in trouble."

"Sumimasen" the blue hedgehog, in a rare show of regret, apologized to Nanoha, understandably thinking he might have offended her, and hoping she'd forgive him.

"Iie, it's alright. I wasn't hurt or anything." Nanoha shook her head and calmly placed her hand on his shoulder. Oddly enough, it seemed like the only one who was surprised by her action was Sonic, himself.

"Uh…Thanks" Sonic awkwardly "scratched" his head quills with his gloves, "Nanoha-san"

"Good, but if we're going to be friends, drop the "-san" and just call me Nanoha." Nanoha corrected her not-quite-friend-but-getting-close, "Do you still feel that "tug" you mentioned now?"

"Yeah, it's a lot stronger too, though that's probably because of the familiar thing" Sonic shrugged and turned to take his leave, "Well I think I'll go rescue the Tutorial Ferret from your mom. See if he can tell me more about this whole "magic" thing."

"You can probably get some training in too" Nanoha added, "Onee-chan's not the best cook in the café, so whenever she isn't reading, she's in the dojo."

"Ja ne!" The hedgehog once again got into his Super-peel-out and used it to launch off into a burst of speed in the direction he came.

"Ja ne!" Nanoha called out and back after him. Only a few seconds passed though before she suddenly realized something, "ACK!"

"What?" Alisa asked, curiosity taking her over.

"E-eh... it's just something I forgot to warn him about" Nanoha, in embarrassment, rubbed the back of her head, "Onee-chan's almost as bad as okaa-san with cute things… Yuuno-kun might be in trouble."

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 3<br>Link and Adjustment**

* * *

><p><strong>[Midori-ya café]<br>[Dojo]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Somehow, Sonic had managed to rescue Yuuno from the clutches of Momoko Takamachi, though he learned a lesson from doing so: Don't separate Nanoha's mother from cute things unless you had a good reason. Luckily, training and the fact that Momoko had to cook for her café took more precedence, if only a little, over her fondness for cute things. Despite that, the blue hedgehog had a sinking feeling that he would be the next one under the crosshairs if he wasn't careful.

For Yuuno, it was one hassle after another, and he wasn't sure if it could get any worse; not only was he forced to reveal some secrets about his world's magic, but in front of civilians of a world in which a low cover was required. The easy way to settle his mind would have been to just blame everything on the blue hedgehog, with which he has been in something of a perpetual argument with since they met, but he couldn't do that; it was his own responsibility since day one.

'_If I didn't get him involved, Sonic would be living on his own and not as Nanoha-san's familiar. And I can't blame Nanoha's family and friends for knowing… I had to tell them because they would've been concerned for her safety otherwise. I'm just glad I didn't have to tell them about…' _Yuuno Scrya was pulled from his thoughts by a few taps of a gloved finger. Poor ferret was jolted alert, "Uwah!"

"We're here," Sonic said as he gestured to the center part of the dojo that they had arrived to. The hedgehog also noted Miyuki Takamachi, the older sister of Nanoha, who was reading a book until the two had arrived, "And unless you want to share your thoughts with the rest of the class, I'd like to get my training started."

"H-hai, I think we can start with your physical training. Because familiars, at least in theory, have access to all the spells their mages can use; we don't have to focus on that aspect yet." Yuuno nodded and let out a brief sigh of relief, _'Yeah, I don't think I'll need to inform anyone about "Them" yet, they haven't gotten involved here and I'm probably going to be in enough trouble with them already because I nearly broke cover about magic.'_

"What about Nanoha-chan?" Miyuki asked, while she understood how important Sonic's status as her sister's familiar was, she also hoped that Nanoha wouldn't be too unprepared to deal with the threat, "Will you handle the magic teaching with her?"

"A-actually... there was a reason Raising Heart, her device, only allowed me to be a "guest" user to her. I'm not that good at combat magic." the Tutorial Ferret hung his head low, "I can teach her some of the basic middle and long range shooting spells, but so can Raising Heart."

"Eh?" Both Sonic and Miyuki stared at the ferret; they apparently either missed something, or Yuuno's explanation might have been a bit too technical, "Come again?"

"Oh right, I forgot to explain how our magic works. There are a lot of factors in our spells including power input, type and range. Raising Heart's going to be going over this with her master too. No doubt she's already teaching Nanoha the basics I'm going to go over with you right now via image training." The ferret explained a bit further, hoping he was understood, "There is a method that mages can use to communicate between one another; that same method can be used between a mage and their device and their familiar as well; most mages call it "Mindspeak". Raising Heart's probably using that method to run training programs with Nanoha in her mind with image training"

"Hee hee hee..." Sonic suddenly giggled a bit in youthful amusement; he quickly explained when he caught the two staring at him, "I think Nanoha just found out that her device thing can do that. Because of that mindspeak thing the ferret's talking about, Nanoha might be accidentally broadcasting me some things; and judging by the squeals I'm hearing right now, I think she just went through her first program. Ouch, yup! If that was the real thing, she'd probably be feeling that in the morning."

"Right…" Yuuno had an anime-style sweat drop fall from his head in exasperation while Nanoha's older sibling giggled a bit herself. The ferret shook it off and went back to Tutorial mode, "Anyways, for our magic; there are many factors that are calculated in our spells. The Mana is the main source of a spell's power, and it comes from a false organ we call the "Linker Core"; mages, and the familiars they create, rely on their Linker Cores for magic power. The familiar also relies on their mages Linker Core for life as well."

"Like a battery?" Sonic asked, drawing the comparison

"That's one way to sum it up" the ferret nodded, "Next factor is the spell's type; it is determined by what the spell does when it's used. Types are a further classification of a spell's category. For example: spells under the "Attack" category have types that include but aren't limited to: shooting, bombardment and melee. Other categories include Defense, Capture, Support and Force Field, each has their own types."

"So, say, and I'm probably going to feel stupid for trying this connection" the blue hedgehog attempted to draw another comparison, "In RPG video games, some magic was used to heal, boost up stats or lower them, is that kind of true here?"

"Sort of, some mages are taught healing spells and they can be useful in a combat situation, but it depends on what the mage wants their spell to do." Yuuno nodded again in confirmation, "Lastly, the "Range" is the distance for in which spells are effective. The closest distance is between a mage and their target is called "Cross Range" (Kurozu Renji in Japanese), this is the best range for close combat; after that there's "Middle Range" (Midoru Renji), "Long Range" (Rongu Renji)."

"I assume each range has its own perks?" Miyuki asked, slowly understanding the concepts, "Like some of your spells have more effect when you're closer or farther from your foe?"

"Yup; the middle range is for high-speed (and aerial) shooting spells while long range focuses more on bombardments and wide-area spells. Raising Heart will focus on the middle and long range spells with Nanoha-san. That said, as her familiar, you'd best focus on the cross range. Most familiars should be able to cover for the weak points for their mages…" the ferret hung his head low and let out a long sigh; he certainly talked a lot, and it wore him down. His weak state didn't help much either, so, hopefully he made his explanation clear, "Understand?"

"Got it" Sonic nodded as he and Miyuki were able to understand the majority, "Alot of focus on combat, though."

"Maybe so, but that's kind of how it goes. Anyways, close combat…" Yuuno shrugged a bit; he then quickly changed the topic, he went through enough with them for one day and the more time he spent explaining left less time for training and preparations for the next inevitable Jewel Seed to reveal itself. The ferret awkwardly gazed up at Miyuki Takamachi, "Um…"

**[BGM: "Paradigm Shift" Final Fantasy XIII-2 OST]**

"I guess it's my turn then" Miyuki stood up and removed her glasses; she was already dressed in the appropriate robes for the dojo anyway. She took out four wooden training swords from a nearby rack and tossed two of them to Sonic, "Here! Take these and hold them like you were holding your own last night. We're going to first work on your stance. A solid stance is the first thing you should focus on in a fight because it sets your foundation."

"Right!" Sonic caught the wooden swords and held them in each hand with their respective normal and reverse grips, much like last night. He then bent his knees a little bit and tried to settle into a stance, though he noticeably looked a bit rigid and fidgety, "Like this?"

"It's not bad for a start, but, you still need work" Miyuki calmly walked close to the hedgehog and knelt down so she was at a good level to work with him, "You want to be comfortable in your stance, otherwise it's no good. Here…"

Yuuno watched as the girl worked with the hedgehog's stance and adjusted it so he could have a comfortable slight bend of his knees and his hands were adjusted so that they were a fair distance from one another and the two blades wouldn't get crossed and interfere. The ferret couldn't help but notice that the hedgehog, despite his attempts to hide it, didn't appear to be very comfortable being so close to the human. Despite that, however, if the discomfort interfered with the lessons Miyuki was teaching, neither she nor Sonic were showing it.

'_I don't think I've seen someone so reserved around humans, but at least he's giving this one a chance.'_ Yuuno thought to himself in observation, _'He said earlier that he didn't have a good impression about humans and he was hoping Nanoha would help it improve. I know that something happened to his home and a human is involved, but what happened? If whatever happened can be considered criminal, what am I supposed to do when I find out?'_

'_Okay, she's helping me… and she doesn't expect much in return for her help'_ Sonic thought as Miyuki went through the different stances suited for offensive and defending actions. It was a slow start, but he was starting to accept the human's help, _'She only wants me to protect her sister, and I think that's fair.'_

"There we go" Miyuki gave the hedgehog an encouraging and mature smile, "Aren't you learning fast?"

"Well I'm not just fast on my feet" the blue hedgehog grinned in his slowly-building confidence, "What's next? I'm ready for anything"

"Come at me" Miyuki settled herself into a defensive stance with the wooden swords she had, "Watch what I do to block and counter your attacks; don't worry about getting hurt either, I'm not going to be hitting you hard enough."

The hedgehog was reluctant at first, but he eventually rushed in and tried to engage Miyuki with the wooden swords. Much as expected, he awkwardly missed most of his strikes and was countered at every angle, and though Miyuki held back, she still finished her counters and pointed out the weak points that she noticed in the hedgehog's form. Many times throughout the session, Sonic would either attack or defend, and Miyuki would usually knock him to the floor while pointing out a specific weak point that she, and others after her, would be able to capitalize on and show him how to correct it.

The training continued throughout the first part of the day with breaks permitted and soon the first training session had come to a close. To summarize all that happened, Miyuki had covered most of the basics with Sonic, but she, respecting his inexperience, only covered the basics until he could adjust to using two swords. The hedgehog's ability to be a quick study added to Miyuki's calm and patient personality helped to make the first session a solid success. But they both knew that Sonic still had a long way to go.

* * *

><p><strong>[Seishou Elementary School]<br>[No BGM]**

Much like Sonic had a few failures to start his training, Nanoha also had gotten off to a less than stellar start with Raising Heart and the image training, but she managed to adjust quickly like her familiar did. Her device's explanation of the magic basics was clear, to the point, and easy to understand, allowing Nanoha to just absorb it all. The only issue that came up was the initial adjustment to multi-tasking between taking notes of her elementary school classes and the basic magic lessons.

She accomplished a few things from her first magic lesson in the image training before school was over. She and her device agreed on a schedule of when lessons would be less of an inconvenience. While she can multi-task between the lectures of her device and schoolteacher, when a test came around, all of her attention must be focused on it, so it would have to hold. In addition, during her cram school, she wouldn't be as available either because of the content she was learning.

That also extended to her assistance with the Jewel Seeds. It would be impossible for her to help out during regular school and cram school, but after that, she would be free. That information also helped Yuuno on the front with training Nanoha's familiar. Because Sonic needed just as much training, he'd be able to get the most training while Nanoha was in her regular school and cram school. Other than that, he'd be free to help Nanoha in their Jewel Seed hunt.

The sound of the bell signified the end of the school day. Nanoha, feeling satisfied for the success she got out of the day with her multi-tasking taking notes in her regular school and her image training with Raising Heart, stood up from her chair and stretched with a cute yawn. Though, in doing so, she also had left herself wide open for a little surprise, and Alisa Bannings was not one to let the opportunity fall by the wayside.

Alisa, in a mischievous manner, pulled on one of Nanoha's long pigtails and was granted by the cute and comical sight of Nanoha flailing her arms and whining in surprise. All Suzuka could do was watch and giggle softly, not that she had much intention of interfering, she, like Alisa, did enjoy having fun and messing with their best friend. As a bonus, when Alisa finally released the tail of hair, Nanoha glanced at the two with an expression that was a cute, little mix between pouty and exasperation.

* * *

><p><strong>[Route from the school]<br>[No BGM]**

A nice round of tea and sweets following a long day of school was what the trio of elementary third graders agreed to, on multiple reasons. For Nanoha, it would let her check on Sonic and Yuuno to see how the training went on their side, plus make sure they left her house in one piece while she was out. As for Alisa and Suzuka, while they both had mansions they lived in and Suzuka's family had maids that she respected, there was something about the Midori-ya café that had an appeal of its own; the appeal may have been helped by its two new residents.

"You think Sonic-kun and Yuuno-kun would like if we brought them some sweets?" Nanoha asked, "It might help them both and save okaa-san the time to make them herself so she can work the café more."

"That sounds good" Alisa agreed as they passed a small store with a window that had a boutique of fancy jewelry and an elegant dress on display. Nanoha couldn't help but sneak a glance at the display.

"I think we may be a little bit too young to be wearing that, Nanoha-chan" Suzuka softly teased, "and they look expensive too."

"Mou…" Nanoha pouted a bit and stepped back to join her friends. However, as she walked she suddenly had to stop in her step as a sudden jolt got to her and time seemed to stop for a moment or two "Ah?"

**[BGM: "Inflexible Determination" Final Fantasy X]**

"Nanoha-chan?!" Alisa, the first to notice her friend's stop in movement, asked in concern, "What's up?"

"I just felt something" Nanoha looked up and around for a bit as if to determine what that feeling was; she had also reached out to the ferret and hedgehog, _"Yuuno-kun?! Sonic-kun?! Did you both feel that too?"_

"_Yeah, I felt something. It was like a sudden feeling that something's going on." _Sonic answered back via the mindspeak, _"And so did our Tutorial Ferret."_

"_Another Jewel Seed has activated"_ Yuuno confirmed, and as much as he'd like to deny it, the well-deserved, albeit a joke of a title was starting to grow on him, _"It's close by too! Head towards the source, we'll meet you there!"_

"_Hai!"_ Nanoha nodded and blinked a bit to recollect her surroundings. To her surprise, Alisa and Suzuka didn't turn tail and run, instead they gave her a questioning look. The question unneeded to be asked was answered, "Yuuno-kun said a Seed was activated, and it's close by. I'm going to take care of it."

"You're not going alone" Alisa stopped short of jumping in front of her best friend's path, "We're coming with you!"

"It could be dangerous" Nanoha cautioned them, though she knew full well that she couldn't physically stop them from tagging along. She started to run toward the source of the feeling she found.

"Nanoha-chan, that's even more reason for us to come" Suzuka countered with a valid point, as she was easily able to keep up with her friend, "We're your friends, and if you get hurt doing this, then we couldn't forgive ourselves for not being there to help"

"You could get hurt too…" Nanoha made her last argument, but again didn't break stride as she got closer, "Are you okay with that?"

"We'll do our best to stay out of the way" Alisa grinned a bit, completely honest, "Plus I'm kind of excited to see what you can do for real."

"Mou...you two are stubborn" Nanoha sighed, fell silent and continued to run.

* * *

><p><strong>[Temple Steps]<br>[BGM: "Inflexible Determination" Final Fantasy X OST]**

It took them five minutes to arrive at their destination, but when they did. The trio was greeted by Sonic and Yuuno; both of them, for once, had agreed on something. They were both disappointed in the girls, though for different reasons, and Sonic's was more comical while Yuuno's was more serious.

"You're late!" Sonic pouted a bit with his hands on his hips and his foot tapping in comical impatience, "I could've zoomed over to the coffee shop and pick up a cup before you girlies got here."

"Well sorry for not having the great gift of super speed" Alisa snarked in retort and, in a fashion that made the obvious size difference between the two known, looked down at the blue hedgehog, "Like most people, we're not as fast as you, so we had to run at normal speed."

"Touché" The blue hedgehog shrugged with no effort to argue, "But something's got the Tutorial Ferret's panties in a knot."

"W-wha?! I don't wea- ugh! Why am I arguing with you again?!" Yuuno sighed in exasperation, once again unable to take a joke from the blue hedgehog. He focused his attention on Nanoha and gave her a rather disappointing look, one that easily predicted his upcoming lecture, "Why did you bring your friends here? We're here to seal a Jewel Seed, not go on a picnic."

"Sorry, Yuuno-kun" Nanoha looked down, "They wanted to come"

"Ha… fine, but they are your resp- Gack!" Yuuno's lecture was cut short by a gloved hand grabbing him by the fur, "What the?! Hey?!"

"I think Nanoha's friends are well aware of the dangers, thank you very much Tutorial Ferret-kun. Now let's get going, I'll even give you a head start" Sonic softly threw the ferret up a few steps and that gave him the message to move on. The blue hedgehog followed suit, though slow enough for the other girls to keep up. Oddly enough, he was surprised to see Suzuka, despite her appearance, had a sizeable lead on her friends up the stairs; though he also refrained to comment on it and just passed it off as a better start.

After the long stairway climb, the group was greeted to the sight of a familiar pink-haired jogger on the wrong end of a glare by a very vicious, demonic looking dog with two extra eyes above where the normal ones should've been at, razor sharp teeth with multiple fangs on both sides of its jaw; and it also sported a tall and intimidating build.

The teen looked scared out of her mind and tried to step back while seated flat on her butt. All it took was one small step forward from the dog and the girl lost consciousness in pure fright. The sudden familiarity of the girl was noted by Alisa Bannings first.

"Oy! That girl! She's the same one we saw yesterday" the dirty-blonde Anglophone pointed to the girl and her dog in recognition, "That means the dog is the same one that was yapping at me yesterday too."

"H-how did it get so big?!" Suzuka asked in surprise and probably some fear

"A lot of kibble?" The hedgehog offered a brilliantly-timed quip

"It's been possessed by a Jewel Seed" Yuuno quickly explained

"That too" Sonic added calmly

"And even more bad news, it's a lot tougher when whatever the seed possesses has a stable form." The ferret pointed out as well, almost as calm, his experience paying a factor in the calmness.

As if it smelt new prey, the seed-possessed-dog focused its attention on the group of new arrivals. However, once its glance caught the sight of Alisa Bannings, it growled out loudly and started to approach her.

"I think he knows you" Sonic frowned as he moved into a defensive position, but didn't call his Barrier Jacket or weapons yet.

"Nanoha! Use Raising Heart" Yuuno quickly and sternly instructed the new mage, "Recite the password to use her!"

"E-EH?! The password?!" Nanoha blinked, "B-but it's too long, and I can't remember it..."

"You'll be fine, just rep…" Yuuno was again about to say something, but for the umpteenth time, he was interrupted by a gloved hand over his little ferret mouth, "Mmmph!"

"Yeah, I don't think Fido over there's going to give us time to recite a soliloquy" Sonic quipped as he noted the dog getting closer to Alisa, almost within the range of a pounce, "Nanoha, if that device is as intelligent as the Tutorial Ferret says, I think you might be able to get away with just asking it nicely."

"I'll give that a try!" the girl nodded and held Raising Heart in her left hand. Just before the dog could pounce on her friend, she quickly stepped in front of her, "Raising Heart, Onegai!"

"_**Alright, Standby ready!"**_ The device chimed and under the cover of a well-timed barrier, it changed Nanoha's school uniform to her Barrier Jacket and also shifted to Device form.

* * *

><p><strong>[Vs Jewel Seed: Dog possession]<br>[BGM: "Crimson Blitz/Blinded by Light" Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII OST]**

"Whoa…" Alisa let out a breath that she didn't even know she had held, "Thanks Nanoha"

"And now it's my turn!" Sonic grinned, quickly shifted to his own Barrier Jacket and wielded the twin kodachi blades that came with the jacket. It wasn't hard for him to do so as he remembered the feeling he had when he became Nanoha's familiar and how the jacket and weapons just appeared on him during the time. As a sample of his fleet feet, he quickly forced the demonic dog away from the magic barrier with a simultaneous strike from both blades.

'_She changed without having to recite Raising Heart's password… She didn't even take damage from absorbing its attack head on either… She has a lot of potential in her'_ Yuuno stared at the girl in awe. His awe was replaced by confusion when he noticed that instead of focusing on the new mage and familiar, the Jewel Seed beast still had its sight locked onto Alisa, "Ano... why is it still after your friend?"

"I kind of shut it up yesterday when it was just a small little guy" Alisa admitted in some guilt, "And I think it wants payback."

"Well I'm about to send it to the pound" the blue hedgehog smirked and shouted out to the mutt, "Bad dog! No biscuits for you!"

On another roar from the possessed dog, Sonic primed his blades up and rushed in to engage the dog. He struck hard and fast with the twin swords in a four-slash combo with two slashes for each blade. His combo ended with a solid upward kick that sent the dog up into the air, he chained it with a downward kick that grounded the mutt. Though, for all his work, the dog wasn't nearly as strong as it looked and it went down barely within a minute.

"Awe... down already" the blue hedgehog bent his wrists against his hips in a sort of impatient/waiting gesture while his foot tapped, "I was expecting more..."

'_It only went down so fast because he never let up from his attack, such speed and strength'_ Yuuno mentally observed, almost as amazed of Nanoha's familiar as he was of the new mage herself, _'I can see why they are both of the proper nature. They have so much potential.'_

"All I have to do is seal it" Nanoha noted in observation, "Right?"

"H-hai!" Yuuno nodded after Nanoha's voice woke him from his amazed stupor

"_**Canon Mode!"**_ As if reading its master's mind, Raising Heart shifted its form. The near-circle that encased the large gem representing the device was replaced by a square shaped holder with two prongs holding the orb-like gem inside; in addition, the neck of the staff also gained a trigger grip.

Much like the night before, streams of pinkish mana surrounded the dog and held it in a bind. Upon the beast's forehead appeared the Roman numerals "XVI". Sonic, to make sure the mutt wouldn't be going anywhere, kept a close eye on it. In doing so, he also noted the Roman numerals and translated them, though he probably didn't need to do such as the girls plus ferret could all understand it easily.

"XVI… that would be number 16" Sonic noted and shouted back to Nanoha, "Seal it up!"

"Lyrical Magical! Jewel Seed Serial 16" Nanoha recited the seal incantation, twirled her staff a bit, probably for show, and pointed it right at the dog, "Seal!"

"_**Sealing!"**_ the device declared and the streams tightened their grip on the beast until it disappeared into a bright flash of light that had Sonic, Yuuno and the girls covering their eyes from the brightness. In seconds the monster was gone, replaced by the Jewel Seed that had possessed it. Now inactive, it was easily able to be stored within a device; Raising Heart automatically did such.

"_**Receipt number 16"**_ The intelligent device chimed out.

* * *

><p><strong>[Boss Cleared]<br>[Jingle: "Act Clear" Sonic CD (US)]**

Much to Yuuno's chagrin, he had to watch as Sonic celebrated the victorious seed seal with a cool pose that was the same as last night's but because he was still in his Barrier Jacket, he adjusted by sheathing his kodachi away in the sheathes that were positioned on his back in a manner where the straps don't get cut or interfere with the spines on his back.

Nanoha, feeling a bit inspired by her familiar, tried her own hand at the post-battle-victory pose, she cutely twirled her staff around in her left hand and put it to the ground in a vertical position, still held in her left hand. She also had a cute wink and a smile, "Nipaaa~!"

"Ugh!" Alisa suddenly had to grasp her nose and turn away from the pose; though her reasons for doing so were unknown to Sonic, Yuuno and Nanoha, they weren't unknown to Suzuka.

"Alisa-chan!" the mentioned girl with purple hair helped out her friend. Within almost a minute, whatever she did must've worked because Alisa looked much better, albeit maybe a bit tired for some reason.

"Well… uhm…" Yuuno awkwardly tried to put an end to the fun for the moment, "That's another seed sealed"

"Buzzkill" Sonic sighed again and once again, "Okay, Tutorial Ferret, how many are left?"

"There's 21 of them in total, so, doing the math we're left with 19 unaccounted" Yuuno quickly replied after a calculation or two; his reply came with a small glare in the hedgehog's direction, "Now you're calling me that just to annoy me, right?"

"Nah, you really are giving us a tutorial" the blue hedgehog, not missing a beat, shrugged in response.

* * *

><p><strong>[Late Afternoon]<br>[BGM: "Besaid Island" Final Fantasy X OST]**

Less than an hour had passed and the sun was about to set. The small group of girls plus hedgehog and ferret had decided to stick around the area to make sure that the jogger was okay after she passed out, though they watched her from a discrete spot in the area. Sure enough the jogger teen woke up, though she was a bit disoriented.

"Huh?" The girl with pink hair said as she woke up and looked around, "I wonder if I tripped and hit my head…"

The girl looked around in search of her faithful little dog. In a matter of seconds, her dog ran up to her, its lack of a leash apparent. The dog just sat in front of her, letting out a few friendly barks. With a small shrug as if nothing happened that she should be worried about, the girl picked up her dog and walked down the steps and off towards their home in the city.

The group of kids, to reflect on their eventful long day, had a nice, peaceful chat on the top step of the stairs, just underneath the red arch. Sonic and Nanoha both were out of their respective Barrier Jackets by that point as well, since there was no need for them at the time.

"So is it safe to say that we did a good job today?" Nanoha asked Yuuno innocently

"Yeah I guess, considering all that has happened" the ferret nodded in agreement, "A few more people know about out magic than I would've liked, but, at least they were the ones you could trust."

"I won't tell anyone" Alisa assured him with an honest tone.

"Me neither" Suzuka nodded in agreement

"Please… The less people who know about this, the better" Yuuno requested, "I've already put everyone in danger here by getting you involved. One of you almost got killed last night too."

"Again with the guilt…" the small blue hedgehog shrugged, "Don't worry about it. I made the choice to get involved."

"So ends our first…" Nanoha said aloud in thought, as if to change the topic and get Yuuno from his little guilt phase, "My first day as a mage, and Sonic-kun's first day as my familiar. I think it turned out great, don't you all agree?"

"Yeah" the blue hedgehog gave the girl a thumb-up gesture, "I actually had some fun with that last seed monster thing."

"You looked better with your swords in this fight too" Yuuno complimented in observation, "Are you starting to get used to this? Being a familiar and the magic"

"Yeah; I mean it is different, suddenly living off someone's magic/energy thing" the blue hedgehog shrugged, "But I'm a fast study, so I think I can get used to all of this real quick. How are you feeling about all of this, Nanoha?"

"I'm kind of happy; I got to make new friends with Sonic-kun and Yuuno-kun" the girl replied, explaining her feelings slightly. She was the first to stand up after a brief silent moment had passed, "Well, a lot sure has happened."

All of a sudden, to the embarrassment of everyone except Alisa Bannings, a collective grow from their stomachs was heard. The blushes that adorned their faces added to a cute moment that had been made.

"Looks like we sure all hungry from all of that" Alisa cheekily grinned, "Who's up for snacks at Nanoha-chan's house?"

"E-eh?! Why me?" Nanoha cutely argued back, "You both have houses of your own to go home to."

"That is true" Suzuka nodded, not disagreeing with Alisa, "But I think yours will be more entertaining, and my onee-chan also works at your family's café so I can always go home with her."

"Um, what about Sonic?" Yuuno curiously brought up a point of his own, "Wouldn't his presence at the Nanoha's café raise questions with the customers and staff?"

"Not really" Alisa shrugged, "It's not like Sonic-kun's from another world."

"If anything, they might be relieved that someone from where he's from was willing to come here, considering…" Nanoha added but left the statement hanging for her friends plus hedgehog to draw their conclusion. She also sent a reassuring smile at the mentioned hedgehog, _'But, considering our usual type of customers; they might try to take him home with them. I hope I don't grow up to be like those teenage girls.'_

"If it helps, we'll let Sonic be the one to decide where we go" Suzuka offered and drew attention to the hedgehog, "What do you think?"

"Well…." Sonic had a lot to think about, and that played into his silence throughout the conversation. On one hand, Nanoha could be right and he'd be given a bit of a warm welcome to the café, but on the other hand it could go south. Eventually, he decided to go with his gut feeling of confidence, and his growing hunger, "I'm up for it, let's go"

"Okay!" The trio of girls chimed in agreement and led the way for Sonic and Yuuno to follow en route to the Midori-ya.

'_I need to find out what I am missing here'_ Yuuno thought as he followed, _'I didn't research this world enough before I came here, that's a mistake I need to fix.'_

**[Midori-ya Café]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Within a matter of minutes, the girls plus hedgehog, along with the ferret who had opted to ride on Alisa's shoulder, had arrived at the Midori-ya café. Either by mistake or design, but they all entered from the front door, the telltale bell ringing alerted the few customers inside to the new arrivals. There was a bit of a brief silence throughout the café when everyone saw the hedgehog, but, much like what Nanoha said, they didn't pay him any ill will and instead just happily went about their business and the peaceful atmosphere was kept intact.

"See, I told you" Nanoha told Sonic as they all took a seat at the bar of the café, "Have a little more faith"

"I'll try" the hedgehog nodded reluctantly

"Suzuka-chan!" a familiar voice and figure approached the young girl called out to. The 18-year old girl who had approached was her older sister, Shinobu, dressed in the appropriate uniform for the café, "I thought you'd be home by now"

"Well we thought it would be a good idea to have tea here after school" Suzuka explained, leaving out the magic incident entirely, "But we kinda got distracted at the mall and we lost track of time."

"Ah, and this is the Midori-ya's latest tenant, at least that's what Momoko-san told me earlier" Shinobu glanced at the hedgehog. Taking into account the nervous feeling she could tell he had, she calmly addressed him with a kind and polite bow, "It's nice to meet you, Sonic-san; I'm Tsukimura Shinobu, Suzuka-chan's older sister. I work here at the café so you'll probably be seeing a lot of me while you're here. Momoko-san's probably going to put you to work here to, so if that happens, don't be afraid to come to me for advice."

"T-thank you very much." Sonic timidly, but with a small smile of growing confidence, "It's nice to meet you too."

Calmly, the girl passed out tea and sweets to everyone but the ferret companion, whom she assumed Momoko would feed later. After he watched her leave, Sonic let out a sigh of relief and was nudged by Nanoha again.

"Like I said; most humans are kind and considerate to strangers, even those like you." Nanoha explained, "So long as you don't do anything to offend them, but you're a bit careful with that too so you should be fine. Just don't try to be too careful otherwise you'll unintentionally cause more harm than good, Understand?"

"Yup!" the hedgehog nodded and took a taste of the tea. To his own surprise, it didn't taste bad and was actually a bit sweet, though he still had a lot to think about after Nanoha spoke to him, _'Nanoha's right… I'm going to be spending a lot of time with her from now on, so I need to trust her. It won't be easy, but I'll do my best!'_

'_I don't know what lies ahead for me and Sonic-kun as mage and familiar'_ Nanoha thought to herself as well as she enjoyed the time with her friends, _'But I'm going to try my best to help Yuuno-kun with the Jewel Seeds and help Sonic-kun open up to humans too.'_

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]  
>[End of Chapter 3]<strong>

Author's note: Well that's about a good 6.8k word count, opening rant set aside. All the solid work that I could do without the word count limit, it's amazing, and I'm liking how this one's developing. Getting a lot of content in and doing great with the details. Reviews please! I love opinions! Canon mode is the combination of Raising Heart's sealing and shooting mode, exclusive to Nanoha MOVIE the 1ST… And, about the Jewel seed possess dog first going after Alisa, I had a bit of thinking when I saw the scene in the anime, same dog as episode one and Alisa did shout at it loudly; could've taken it a bit hard. By the way, for those who were wondering how some humans can simply take Sonic's presence in stride, considering that the islands that Sonic is from is set here all on the same planet, it's most likely that they've seen some of his kind before, either in the news or something like that and just got used to it. They would've had more issue if he was causing havoc, of course, but since he isn't; who is anyone to care what he does? On another note, the Tutorial Ferret is still holding something back, what could it be that Yuuno hasn't said that he's all nervous about?


	4. Chapter 4

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in a new chapter to Lyrical Familiar. New story, new possibilities, and I plan on getting deep into the content of this arc. Going even beyond the Nanoha movie AND the anime with the Sound Stage coverage, which this chapter specifically gets into. Anime and movie can only cover so much; the Sound Stages help that out. I may also cameo a few more characters too. Let's go!

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Time: 0530]  
>[No BGM<strong>

Barely a few days have passed since Nanoha and Sonic's own first day as a mage and familiar. Neither of them seemed bothered by the fact that they were dragged into helping the young archeologist, Yuuno Scrya, in his search for the Jewel Seeds. To Yuuno's greater surprise, Sonic, who, if not for Nanoha becoming a mage, would've been dead, did not hold any ill will against the ferret; and the teasing, witty and sarcastic streak the hedgehog seems to have only came with his carefree attitude. So far, they managed to seal two Jewel Seeds in as many days, and, counting the seed the ferret had already sealed prior to his coming to earth, their count was up to 3. Out of 21, that left 18 unaccounted for, but they at least made some progress.

To give Nanoha and Sonic their first taste in magic training and because there were some lessons that could only be learnt in a hands-on lesson; Yuuno had taken the two to a vacant lot close to the café. They all woke up early so, in theory, they wouldn't cause much of a ruckus and be able to sneak out of the house without the family noticing.

Sadly, the trio, not being the stealthiest of early-risers or mages, had also woken up the rest of Nanoha's family. Instead of stopping the three, they instead decided to tag along for the shared reasons of the reasonable curiosity, much to Yuuno's chagrin. The ferret, wisely so, didn't voice any reservations against the family tagging along, and he couldn't stop them anyway, so it wouldn't have mattered if he tried.

They all watched as Nanoha, clad in her Barrier Jacket, stood on the ground with a large glyph circle of magic at the center of her feet. The circle was inscribed with rings and squares; and at the corners of the rings were the Greek letters Pi, Delta, Omega and Vu. The humans couldn't help but look at the circle in awe. Nanoha would have as well, if she wasn't already focused on the target dummy Yuuno borrowed from the Takamahci family dojo.

To Nanoha's right was her familiar, also clad in his Barrier Jacket, though his swords were sheathed and his arms were folded. The Tutorial Ferret had strongly requested that the hedgehog save his wit for after training as it could be dangerous if Nanoha were to lose her focus. Much as he'd like to have fun with his mistress, Sonic obliged, the magic was kinda important to him too.

"Alright, concentrate in your mind" Yuuno instructed, not fazed by the glyphs as he was used to seeing them on a daily basis, "Make an image"

"Hmmm.." Nanoha obliged and tried to focus in her mind about an image, it didn't take her long to get one.

"Good, now take that image into your hand" The ferret continued his instruction, "And transfer it into Raising Heart"

"Okay" the girl nodded and held the staff out in her left hand, "Raising Heart, Onegai!"

"_**Alright!"**_ The red orb of her device chimed in affirmation. If Nanoha's family were surprised, only Miyuki showed it; albeit only a small reaction at that, _**"Standby, ready."**_

'_Okay… Did they just take the fact that Raising Heart talked in stride?!'_ Sonic thought to himself as he just stared at Nanoha's family.

"Now you need to gather the magical energy for that image" Yuuno finished instructing, "Recite your incantation and cast it out all at once."

"Image for the magic…" Nanoha looked awkward as she tried to focus, and then managed to recite her incantation, "Lyrical Magical! Um…. Binding Spell Activate!"

Her spell did not quite work as it sounded. Instead of the target dummy getting wrapped in a binding spell like it should have been; it was blasted in a large, uncontrolled burst of pink mana, courtesy of the mage. While the binds were present, the spell's power was just a bit overcharged and it ended up making the practice dummy target explode. At least she got the spell off, whatever it was; may the target dummy rest in peace.

"Yatta!" Nanoha cheered at that part, "Did I do it right?"

"If "doing it right" means "exploding your target and causing an avalanche of debris and dirt to head right for us", then I'd say you aced it!" Her blue hedgehog familiar quipped and gave her a thumb-up gesture for emphasis. That said, he had little choice but to watch as he and his mistress were about to crash into debris that the backfired spell made, "How the…"

"Eh?" Nanoha blinked, only to gain a comically surprised expression on her face as she noticed the small mix of debris and dirt heading right for her and him, and a little bit too fast for either of them to react to it, "KYAA!"

In a last ditch effort to spare his mistress from at least some of the debris, Sonic took her in a headfirst tackle. His effort didn't get the results he would've liked, as they both were caught up in the mess.

"Nanoha! Sonic!" Yuuno, who just so happened to be on higher ground, rushed down to check on the mage and familiar caught up in the mess. When the dust settled, the sight it revealed made him stare and blush a bit.

**[BGM: "Eeto desu ne" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

The two were in a rather embarrassing position; Nanoha, looking a bit dazed if the swirly signs comically replacing her eyes were of any clue, was seated flat on her butt. Sonic, a little bit more aware, was curled up in her lap.

"That could've gone better." Sonic groaned as he stood up and dusted himself off. Showing some concern for his almost-friend's wellbeing, he offered the girl his hand, "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, somehow" Nanoha took it. She used the offered hand to stand up, "You too, Sonic-kun?"

"Yeah" the blue hedgehog shrugged, "That was interesting"

"Hmmm…" Nanoha agreed with a sigh; she looked down at Yuuno and lamented her mistake, "It doesn't look like I'm doing too well…"

"No, you're actually quite impressive" Yuuno admitted in complete honesty, "It's only been a few days and you're already able to do this much."

"Is that so.." the girl had her doubts and she hung her head low; a gloved hand suddenly patted the top of her head a few times, "E-eh?"

"Don't worry" Sonic chimed with a supportive tone, "You're doing great; keep up the good work!"

"I kind of understand how to use attack and protection spells now" Nanoha thought out loud with her familiar nodding in agreement.

"You both seem to be really good with the high energy spells, and possess a great amount of mana reserves when you combine them together. However, you both lack in concentration and finesse" The ferret explained.

"Umm… Does that mean we're the type that relies more on brute force?" Nanoha asked, not quite sure if she should be proud of that.

"E-eh?! Ah…" Yuuno blinked rapidly. Uhoh, quick! Backpedal! "T-that's not what I meant."

"Guilty" Sonic only needed one word to counter.

"A-anyways, you both don't need to worry about that." The ferret said in encouragement, "I can support you both with the Barrier and Capture spells, even if I am still in recovery."

"That doesn't let her off the hook. She still needs to learn them so I can use them too." Sonic noted, "You said the other day that I'll need to be able to cover for her weak points."

"That's true…" Yuuno hung his head low; much as he disliked the hedgehog's blunt statements, they still bring up solid points.

"Nanoha-chan!" Momoko called out to the group, getting their attention, "It's time for breakfast!"

"Hai!" the girl brightly chimed back. She turned to her device and called out to it, "Thanks for today, Raising Heart. We'll train again soon"

"_**Goodbye"**_ the device chimed back and shifted back to standby mode. At the same time, both Nanoha and Sonic disengaged their barrier jackets and, with Yuuno Scrya in tow, met back up with the family so they could go in for breakfast.

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 4<br>Big problem at the pool with swimsuits?!**

* * *

><p><strong>[Midori-ya Café]<br>[BGM: "Honobono" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

After the training was over, Nanoha and Sonic took turns in the shower before, at least more so on Nanoha's part, getting dressed and eating breakfast at the family dining table. As for Sonic, it had only been a few days since he first started living in the household, so he was considered a "guest", and given some slack about some of the minor customs. However, if the hedgehog plans on living there much longer, he would need to follow the customs and rules of the household as he would, rightfully so, not be considered a guest.

"Sonic-san" Shiro addressed the hedgehog politely. The head of the Takamachi family had a need to discuss something with his guest, but took a less in-your-face approach to it "Mind if I ask you a question?"

"Uh sure.." Sonic nodded awkwardly, feeling a tad bit uncomfortable with the formal talk, but chose against voicing that opinion, "What is it?"

"We've let you stay in this house freely for a few days, mainly because of the circumstances involving you and our daughter" The man calmly and neutrally informed the boy, "However, we cannot let you stay here like this for much longer."

"Eh? Otou-san" Nanoha looked at her father in surprise, quickly drawing an assumption, "You're not going to kick him out, are you?"

"No, rest assured, he can still live here" Shiro quickly corrected her, "I'm just saying that we cannot consider him a "guest" for too much longer if he is going to be living here for a long time"

"Oh, yeah, when you put it that way" Nanoha nodded in agreement and turned to face the hedgehog familiar directly, "Um, Sonic-kun, you are going to be living here for a while, right?"

"Yeah, I'm not going to back down on my promise" the hedgehog nodded firmly; his attention shifted back to the father figure, "So, I take it that means I can't be warming up your couch every night from now on?"

"It wasn't really a healthy place to sleep in anyway" Miyuki noted as she sat down, hearing most of the conversation anyways, "But, we don't really have a guest room either"

"He'll have to room with one of us" Shiro concluded quickly, sending a knowing glance at Nanoha, "You don't mind sharing your room, do you Nanoha-chan?"

"E-eh?!" Nanoha just blinked, and gazed at Sonic, who, like her, was just as shocked as she was. She turned back to look at her father, "Um… I don't, but why?"

"In my experience with this sort of situation with you and the hedgehog, I think it's fair to say that he can be considered a guardian or a bodyguard, and in order for that partnership to work out, you both need a good relationship" Shiro noted, "For that reason, you two will need to spend more time with each other and develop that relationship."

"He's right, a good relationship between client and guard help in the long run. Clients will be more likely to enlist our services if the first job goes well and they feel like they can trust us with that relationship." Kyouya nodded in agreement, still remembering his last job.

"I'm not really looking for money or anything" Sonic argued a bit, "But, if you want me to do some of this stuff, I will. If you want me to, I'll also try to work around here and kinda "earn" my stay."

"I'll talk to Shinobu about getting you to work in the café" Momoko noted

"Anyways" Miyuki, deciding to change the topic, turned to her younger sister, "Are you ready for today?"

"Today?" Nanoha looked up in thought, trying to recall if something was important

"You know that new pool that opened up past the bus station?" Miyuki explained to refresh her memory, "You promised to go there after school today with your friends."

"Oh yeah!" Nanoha smiled, "I'm ready"

"_Huh?!" _Yuuno piped up in the mindspeak, reaching out to Nanoha and in the process dragged Sonic into the conversation as well, _"What's going on Nanoha?"_

"_Oh, it was a promise that we made before Yuuno-kun and Sonic-kun came here" _the girl quickly explained away the confusion, _"We're all going to the new pool together"_

"_Oh, a pool.."_ Yuuno nodded in thought

"_Since you two are here as well, you're both going to come as well" _Nanoha innocently said, _"Right, Yuuno-kun, Sonic-kun?"_

"_EH?!" _the ferret blinked a few times and looked between Nanoha and Miyuki, _"Uhmmm.."_

"Not exactly a big water fan because I can't swim" Sonic, instead of answering in the telepathy, opted to speak out, "But, why not? It sounds like fun and I don't have anything to do today anyways."

"You're coming too, Onii-chan." Nanoha asked her older brother, "Right?"

"Yeah" Kyouya nodded, "But I'll be there working as a life guard."

"_Ehm.. Nanoha.. uh.. Nanoha?" _ Yuuno tried calling out to the girl, but his attempts were futile as she didn't listen.

"This will be exciting!" as the girl got more excited for the pool trip, she paid less attention to the ferret, who tried so hard to get her attention, "I'll have a lot of fun with Alisa-chan and Suzuka-chan there too. Maybe we can get Sonic-kun to swim too"

"I'll need a lesson or two first" the hedgehog, eager to join in on the fun, chimed in, "But, yeah, I think I can have some fun"

"_You're not listening to me…"_ Yuuno hung his head in comical defeat.

* * *

><p><strong>[Seishou Elementary School]<br>[Time: 1500 hours (3 pm)]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The end of the school day found Nanoha, Alisa and Suzuka discussing the upcoming pool day while waiting outside of the campus for their ride.

"You both brought your swimsuits, right?" Alisa asked the two

"Yup!" Nanoha chimed cheerfully in reply and held up a bag that had her swimsuit in it.

"I read that the pool has slides and they allow tubes too" Suzuka added, "So I asked Farin to bring one"

"Oh!" Alisa's grin widened at that statement, "That sounds really fun!"

"Swimming with a tube in the pool sounds nice" Nanoha agreed to the statement.

For a few minutes they waited and talked a bit more, while she couldn't deny it when she was asked about how she would be sharing her room with Sonic starting tonight; she was surprised to hear that her friends didn't mind it. Though she couldn't help but laugh when Alisa commented loudly that if the hedgehog tried anything perverted, he'd have to answer to the dirty-blonde girl. Although it could be argued that such thoughts never occurred to Nanoha, and she didn't peg Sonic to be that type either.

The honking of a car horn dragged the three schoolgirls' attention to a limo that just parked next to a nearby curb. If the appearance wasn't familiar enough to Suzuka, the sight of a teenage-looking girl with long light-purple hair and wearing maids outfit was.

"Suzuka-chan!" the girl called out to the trio and waved them over

"Farin!" the heiress addressed her apparent housemaid and, with her friends in tow, went over to greet her. As they did that, out from the driver seat came another girl in a maid uniform. Though, unlike the fist, this one looked like she could be the older sister, her hair was a lighter purple and cut much shorter, just to the end of her neck.

"Alisa-ojou-sama, Nanoha-ojou-sama" the older maid addressed the two, "We've come to pick you up"

"Ah, Noel-san!" Alisa looked quite happy to see the older maid and addressed her like an older sibling figure, a sentiment shared by Nanoha as well.

"Arigatou-gozaimasu" Nanoha politely bowed in gratitude and, with Alisa and Suzuka behind her, went inside the limo before it drove off to the pool.

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence]<br>[Time: 3:10 pm]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

While waiting for Miyuki, who was going to take them to the pool when she got home from an errand, Sonic decided to try and get some cleaning done around the house so that way he'd make a bigger and more favorable impression on the host family; Yuuno, having a major need to research some of the things about this world, turned on the TV to watch the mid-day news.

"… And now for a recent development that we reported last night about the sudden wall collapse in Misaka town in relation to the incident at Makibara animal hospital." The news broadcaster reported, "Upon further investigation, authorities have still yet to find the cause of the incident, though it's been confirmed that no people… excuse me… animals, were reported to have been injured"

"I'd argue differently to that last statement" Sonic quipped as he mopped the wood floors in a pair of borrowed slippers due to having his shoes, gloves, socks and scarf washed with the laundry, "But I technically should've been dead."

"Please be serious about this, Sonic" Yuuno requested with a sigh, "Although I can say that they probably won't be able to find any evidence of magic, the questions raised about the damage will have the authorities keep a better eye around here, and enough people already know about our magic than I would've liked."

"In other news, another day has passed and still the search on South Island has led to no results" the female news co-host reported on the next incident, this one catching Sonic's attention, "A few weeks ago, a once world-renowned genius scientist, Doctor Eggman, announced his declaration of world conquest. He started it by taking over the once peaceful South Island, just south of the harbor here in Uminari. He captured many of the island's inhabitants and used them as power sources for his machines."

Yuuno, stoically and neutrally, watched the report and took note of Eggman's appearance: Human male, bald head with a comically large dark-brown moustache, comically obese, but built much like an egg, red and black outfit, big red and pointed nose with small glasses. The loud, sudden splash caused by the mop jammed inside the bucket that held the water and floor-cleaning mix did not go unnoticed by the ferret, as he noted the blue hedgehog's obvious negative reaction to Eggman's appearance. Instead of commenting on it, however, the ferret chose to continue listening to the news report

"Days later; his base, which he called "Scrap Brain", was destroyed in a mysterious explosion. Authorities have spent the last week searching around the island for clues about the explosion and the whereabouts of Doctor Eggman; neither bearing any results." The news anchor sighed for a moment to gather her breath before finishing the report, "The Uminari City police reports that they will extend the search for another two weeks before recalling their investigative team. While there has been no interference from the island natives, there has been no short of the understandable mistrust. The authorities are currently redoubling their efforts to resolve this incident and retreat from the island before the situation escalates. We'll have an in-depth report on this incident, Eggman and South Island later tonight."

"For an old geezer who looks so much like the human's model of fitness, he can be slippery when he wants to be" Sonic snarked and mopped, "If he doesn't want to be seen, finding that guy's a lost cause."

"You've seen this man in person?" Yuuno questioned, 'Does that mean you've seen what they are reporting about?"

"I had the best seat in the house for the show" the hedgehog merely shrugged and kept working. His silence on the matter was the ferret's golden hint that it probably wouldn't do much good to keep talking about the incident with him.

'_So he does know… maybe he was one of the captured inhabitants? If he was, how did he break out? And if he wasn't how is he able to speak of the incident like he was so close to it' _Yuuno tried to think hard about the mystery, _'The local authorities are currently handling the investigation, but if I'm right about this feeling I have; and I hope I'm wrong, they're going to need some "outside" help. And a mysterious incident like this, plus the Jewel Seeds, would be the perfect reason for the TSAB to start getting involved. I just hope that I can be a big enough help for Sonic and Nanoha to resolve this incident before it escalades to that point'_

"Tadaima!" Miyuki called out as she entered the house, which quickly led Yuuno to turn off the television and start his best attempt of acting like an actual ferret. While the girl and her family know about him, others do not so he had to practice the cover of a house-pet.

"Welcome back" Sonic acknowledged the girl as she came in, "uh, watch your step, I just mopped there"

"I noticed" The girl nodded, no short amount of impressment on her face, "You did a great job here"

"I know how to clean up a mess or two" the hedgehog shrugged.

"Anyways" the teen addressed the two, "Are you ready?"

"Yup!" Sonic nodded with a small grin, "This should be fun"

"Kyun!" Yuuno, though as embarrassing and degrading to him as it was, made his best impression of a ferret cry.

"Well I can say he's ready" Sonic shrugged in reference to the Tutorial Ferret, "But if you're looking for a translation, he literally just said "Kyun"…. Nothing else"

The ferret once again sent another dirty look in the hedgehog's direction, but nothing came from it as the hedgehog just shrugged it off again.

* * *

><p><strong>[Pool]<br>[No BGM]**

The grand opening of a pool certainly can drag a lot of attention and people out to have some fun, especially after a long day of hard work. The pool itself was structured quite well for a crowd with diverse tastes. There was a play/wave area for the youth, a lap pool for some competitive practice and a stage for some reason.

For Kyouya Takamachi, one of the life-guards on duty to ensure the safety of the children around, his work day would prove to be busy. He had one takeaway from the job as his family and their friends would arrive soon.

"Kyouya-san!" And just on cue, out came the mostly female party to have fun, led by Alisa Bannings.

With the obvious exception of Sonic and Yuuno; all of them were wearing a variety of swimsuits. The type of suit ranged from the two piece suits like Alisa Bannings had donned, though hers was a mix of a two-piece and a swimsuit with frills on the top and bottom and her mid-drift on full display; the one-piece suits like the cute ones that Nanoha, Suzuka and Farin had worn; and finally, for the more grown up and risqué there were the bikinis that Miyuki and Noel had sported, neither of them quite too modest about their looks.

"Hello girls" Kyouya took a small detour on his patrol to meet with them. He suppressed a chuckle at seeing the humorous expressions that Sonic and Yuuno, the only other males present in the party, had. Yuuno looked embarrassed and uncomfortable, and as did Sonic, but for different reasons, "And hedgehog and ferret"

"Y-yo.." Sonic weakly waved, and grew a bit weaker at the sight of the rather deep pool. Some past memories and experiences may have influenced his condition.

"Kyun…" the ferret didn't look any better, and he was thankful that his short size made it easy to hide the red-tint of his cheeks.

"That lifeguard look really suits you Kyou-chan" Miyuki complimented, using a rather cute nickname for her older brother. Feeling a bit happy and somewhat of a tease, she got the three boys' attention and directed them to the choice of swimsuits, "What do you guys think of our choice of swimsuits?"

"We were really excited to choose them" Farin chimed, the younger of the two maids for the Tsukimura household. They gave Sonic quite a surprise when he first saw them as he almost mistaken them for robots or machines for some reason, but he quickly quashed that theory upon seeing how kind they were.

"Well.. they um…" Kyouya looked around a little bit, trying to find the right words, while Sonic and Yuuno were speechless; though the hedgehog was more uncomfortable with the water than he was of the girls, but no one, aside from him, could honestly have been able to tell the difference.

"Sexy~?" Alisa teasingly chimed and made a cute pose in an attempt to flaunt that aspect.

"Y-yeah.." the older brother figure had an exasperated sweat-drop at that suggestion, though he couldn't deny that appeal worked for the two in bikinis, though that also could've been influenced by the typical hormonal male mind.

'_I don't think Sonic or Nanoha have noticed this..'_ Yuuno thought to himself as he tried desperately so hard not to stare at the girls in swimsuits and distract himself with more serious thoughts, _'But I'm sensing a weak magical power here… could it be from a Jewel Seed?'_

At any rate, the pool adventure started off quite smoothly. After some kicking, whining, and tricking, Alisa got Sonic to get into the pool, where he almost sunk right away and it was the quick thinking and the surprising amount of strength that Suzuka had that she was able to get him to the shallow end of the pool to start with the basics. For Alisa, while she, Suzuka and Nanoha started to teach the young boy hedgehog on the basics of swimming, she took notice of what looked to be a stage of some sorts close-by with a microphone in the middle of it.

"Kyouya-san?" the girl asked, "What's that stage over there for?"

"Singing" Kyouya answered without missing a beat, "I saw some girls using it earlier. Since it was put in, it seems to be getting popularity"

"Hmmm! Say who wants to sing?" Alisa asked amongst her friends at the pool

"No way" both Nanoha and Suzuka declined, they weren't quite willing to give it a try

"Count me out" Sonic shook his head in decline as well while Yuuno didn't need to answer. Not only would he be bad at it... but also a singing ferret? That would be something that the blue hedgehog will NEVER let him live down.

"Miyuki-san? Farin?" the girl turned to ask the older girls

"No way! I'm bad at it" Miyuki quickly declined as well

"I'll be worse!" Farin shared that sentiment

"If I may" Noel offered, no small amount of amusement and teasing in her tone, "Shouldn't it be the one who suggested it be the first to try? Ne, Alisa-ojou-sama?"

"ugh" the girl just blinked, while everyone else just seemed to gain a rather dangerous aura about them

"Who wants to hear Alisa-chan sing?" Miyuki called out

"Me!" Everyone except for Yuuno chimed out all at once

"Kyun!" The mentioned Tutorial Ferret, still under his regular ferret cover, tried to voice his agreement

"Geh?! Is this some sort of trap?" Alisa, with shades of a tsunderish tone to her voice, groaned, "I should've kept my mouth shut!"

"The receptionist is over there" Kyouya directed the 9 year old to where she could go to sign up for a song.

"Fine then!" Alisa said after going through all the embarrassment of signing up for singing. She took center stage and called out to her friends, "I'll give it my all and show you guys how I can sing!"

**[Alisa's song: "Precious Time" by Rie Kugimiya]  
>(AN: Sorry, no lyrics for this one, I can't find them, therefore skipping!)<strong>

At the end of her song, Alisa was mildly surprised to find that she had drawn more to the crowd than her close friends. The reception she got was pretty good too, a few claps, cheers and such.

"Wow! Sugoi!" Nanoha voiced her excitement and enjoyment with her clapping

"How cute" Noel voiced her approval

"Well I guess it felt pretty good" the dere-dere part of Alisa's personality briefly showed in her modesty

"Encore! Encore!" Sonic called out, though he meant it as a joke

"No!" and the tsun-tsun part returns for Alisa's response

"S-sorry…" The hedgehog quickly took the statement back and flinched, _'Lesson learned, don't mess with her'_

**[BGM: "Tanoshii Kyuujitsu" MGLN OST]**

After all that was said and done, Alisa rejoined her friends in the pool. During the time when the trio of girls were at the wave pool, their resident ferret finally had something to be proud of. Something that FINALLY gave him an advantage over his blue hedgehog rival: the ability to swim! The girls found it rather humorous and cute that Yuuno was acting in a proud/flaunting manner over something that he held over Sonic's head, while the hedgehog was doing his best impression of a tsundere pouty schoolgirl.

"Of course, Tutorial Ferret now has something to hold over my head…" the hedgehog pouted, "He probably won't let me live it down.."

"There there, Sonic-kun" Alisa, the resident tsundere, shared the hedgehog's feelings, and did her best to cheer him up "We'll teach you how to swim, ne girls?"

"Hai!" Suzuka and Nanoha chimed

"Be careful about your belongings" Kyouya called out to the girls\

"Eh?" they all, Miyuki aside, blinked, curiously wondering what the issue was.

"Well." Miyuki voiced an explanation, "Apparently, yesterday, there was this guy who was stealing swimsuits and clothing from the changing rooms."

"And we already caught a boy inside the girl's changing room today" Kyouya added, his tone matching his concerned expression, "There hasn't been any incidents yet as far as attacks or anything, but there's a lot of young female customers here.. so we have to be careful."

"_Say, Nanoha"_ Yuuno asked the girl via mind-speak, _"Do you mind if I have a look around?"_

"_Um.. sure," _Nanoha replied positively, though she couldn't help but voice her worries, _"Will you be alright though? Like afraid you could get lost?"_

"_I'll be fine"_ the ferret waved her concern away and took off for another direction.

While Nanoha and Alisa, with the help of Noel, helped Sonic in learning how to swim, Suzuka and Miyuki decided to have a race of a few laps in the lap pool. Even though she was much shorter, Suzuka still gave the older girl a run for her money. Nevertheless she came up short and Miyuki won. What neither of them knew was that Alisa had talked with Farin about a little penalty for the loser, and that penalty was the loser would have to sing. Much to her reluctance and embarrassment, Susuka walked up to the stage and gave her song.

**[Suzuka's song: "Definitely Stand by You" by Ai Shimizu]  
>[AN: Due to an already high word count, the lyrics will not be shown]<strong>

For Suzuka, it was embarrassing, but she managed to sing the whole song, and much like Alisa, she too drew a nice crowd and response.

* * *

><p><strong>[Boiler Room]<br>[BGM: "Inflexible Determination" FFX OST]**

Elsewhere, things were not so peaceful, as Kyouya, off of his shift in the pool, had patrolled the Boiler Room in search of any trouble makers. Little did he know that he would indeed get that trouble; as there was something brewing in the boiler room, but it wasn't entirely human.

"What the?!" Kyouya stared ahead of him in confusion, he couldn't see what the thing ahead of him was due to the dark shadows, but what he did catch looked more liquid-like.

'_Oh no! This power… it's activated'_ Yuuno detected the growing power and quickly rushed to the boiler room to check it out, calling out to Nanoha and Sonic, _"Nanoha! Sonic! A Jewel Seed has activated!"_

"_We know… We could feel its power" _Nanoha replied back from the pool area and quickly got out with Sonic in tow to dry off and head off to the source of the power they felt.

"What is tha- ugh!" Kyouya's thoughts were immediately interrupted by a harsh impact with the metallic side of one of the boilers and he was rendered unconscious. Luckily for him, the blow wasn't really all that hard and he wouldn't suffer any permanent injuries aside from a headache he'd wake up with in the morning.

"Kyouya-san!" Yuuno rushed inside to check on the unconscious young man. Seeing the lack of injuries, the ferret tried to see the Jewel Seed monster. With no success, he moved onto plan B, "Standard Barrier! Expand!"

The sudden expansion of a barrier caught Nanoha and Sonic, both clad in their Barrier Jackets, a bit off guard and made them stop for a moment. That in turn also allowed them to get a good look at just what they were facing.

The monster looked large and entirely made out of water. Despite the animal-like growls it made, it didn't seem to have any distinct features aside from the pinkish-red eyes. The Jewel Seed looked like it was in where the monster's forehead would be if it had a face.

"Uwah!" Nanoha shouted in shock and surprise, "It's big! Is it a water monster?"

"Looks like it" Sonic just stared, holding his blades in a neutral position, and much to his and Nanoha's surprise, the monster took one look at them, but turned away and headed for the pool.

"Nanoha! Sonic!" Yuuno called out to them as the ferret managed to catch up to his allies, "Thank goodness I caught up.. I managed to make a barrier, but the range is so huge that there are still some people trapped inside"

"We better help them out" Sonic declared and, after grasping his mistress's hand, revved up his Super-Peel-Out and rushed for the pool. When they got there, they were greeted with yet another surprise, as if one wasn't enough.

* * *

><p><strong>[Pool area]<br>[BGM: "Enemy Attack" Final Fantasy X OST]**

Sure enough, there was panic caused amongst the pool-goers with the loud growls. The lifeguards were really busy in evacuating the area, so that way no one would get hurt. All but two managed to make it out safely. The two that couldn't were Alisa and Suzuka as they were trapped in the wave pool with the monster inside of it.

"Alisa-chan! Suzuka-chan!" Nanoha rushed over to the two with Sonic right behind her. Much to their surprise and Yuuno's shock-but-soon horror, the monster didn't appear to be attacking them.

"W-what is that thing?!" Alisa struggled against its grasp

"It's trying to take our swimsuits off!" Suzuka squealed out as the monster was indeed doing just that.

"Eek! Get off! Don't touch there!" Alisa flailed but her attempts were futile and she, like Suzuka were soon caught and stripped of their suits by the monster.

"Geh!" Yuuno quickly turned his head and body away from the sight of the two nude 9-year-olds. The poor ferret was blushing up a storm and fidgeting, "M-must not look.. m-must not look!"

The monster, after it had stripped the two girls of their swimsuits, spit them out of it and released them into the wave pool. Sonic and Nanoha both watched as it happened; while Nanoha was concerned for her friends, she couldn't quite resist subtly staring at them and blushing a bit in her face.

"H-how mean!" Suzuka cried out as she covered her private areas in an attempt of modesty

"Stealing our swimsuits and spitting us out! Give it back! Give it back!" Alisa pouted and instead of mimicking her friend's modest actions, she flailed her arms and glared at the monster. However, the monster suddenly showed a lack of interest in the two girls and sent a huge tidal wave in their direction, "Uwah!"

"_**Protection"**_ Raising Heart chimed in as Nanoha stood in front of her friends with Sonic in tow. With the protection spell canceling out its attack, the monster moved on to another pool in search for more prey.

"A-alisa-chan. Suzuka-chan" the Barrier Jacket-clad girl, trying and failing to suppress her slightly-pink cheeks, addressed her friends after saving them from the wave, "A-are you alright?"

"H-hai" Suzuka stuttered out, embarrassed from being naked in front of her friends, "T-thanks"

"I'm fine too" the other girl was a bit embarrassed of her naked state, but not so much as Suzuka was, and in fact, she had a bit of a smirk when she noticed the crimson tinted cheeks of the only girl currently wearing any clothes, "Oh, Nanoha-chan? You like what you see? You're staring"

"E-eh?" Nanoha stuttered and sputtered, her blush contradicted her denial, "N-no!"

"You look like you are. I didn't know you liked me that way, you little perv~! I wonder, what happens if I lower my hands" The dirty-blonde smirked a bit more mischievously and slowly started to flaunt her body's childish features in a teasing fashion and attempt of sex appeal. Hoping she'd give Nanoha a little tease of a show. While her efforts did have some success in darkening the poor girl's blush, despite the attempts of Suzuka to stop her; her show didn't last any more than thirty seconds before a thrown towel pelted her right in the face. The force of the impact almost threw her off balance, "Uwah! Hey!"

"Yes, as much as I hate to interrupt your fun. There's still a monster out there and I think it's trying to find a changing room or something, so can we focus?" Sonic deadpanned as he softly gave Suzuka a towel to wrap around herself for modesty. The blue hedgehog stared flatly at the girl and that gave her the message to put the towel on. After watching her doing so, Sonic sighed, "Thank you, now will someone tell me what the heck is up with that thing?"

"Ah! Uhmmm.." Yuuno, finally able to turn and look at the group of thee girls plus hedgehog in the eye, "This is just a guess…but that Jewel Seed may have been activated by a human, and that specific human's desires and interests are influencing its actions."

"So apparently, somewhere in this pool, or wherever that seed was; there was a human who had the desire to collect girl's clothing?" Sonic deadpanned in question, quickly face palming when Yuuno nodded in agreement, "Okay…. Now who was close when that thing activated?"

"Kyouya-san was in the Boiler Room and that was where I sensed the seed's activation, and he was the only one in the room too when the seed activated from what I saw.." the ferret recalled, and quickly tried to defend the apparent culprit of dirty thoughts, "B-but he was unconscious when I found him and the monster was gone before then."

"Kyouya-san is ecchi!" Alisa said firmly

"Onee-san won't like this.." Suzuka shook her head

"Onii-chan." Nanoha was equally disappointed in her brother, who thankfully was unconscious but will definitely have an earful when everything's all said and done

"Uh hello? Girls?" Sonic interrupted them again, "There's still a weird monster over there"

"Say, Sonic-kun…" Alisa leered at the blue hedgehog, making him feel a bit uncomfortable, "Why are you so awfully calm about this? Eh?"

"Where I'm from, clothes are kinda either a luxury or just worn to look cool. Either way, they are optional." the hedgehog shrugged, "I don't really get the whole point of this anyways."

'_Wow he's innocent'_ the trio plus ferret thought in observation.

"Again with the staring, can we hurry up please?" the hedgehog's impatience was starting to show.

"Since it doesn't appear to be doing anything violent or aggressive, it should be easy to seal" Nanoha made an assumption as she, plus Sonic behind her, started to approach the Jewel Seed beast, "Raising Heart?"

"_**Cannon Mode"**_ the device chimed out and morphed into the specific mode. After her device did so, Nanoha focused her attention on the monster and sent out streams of mana to hold the monster tight. The spell did the trick, but there was one little issue, the Jewel Seed did not show its Serial Number.

"Uh.. There's no number to this one.." Sonic observed, cautiously holding his blades in preparation for any trouble.

"I'm going to try and seal it anyway" Nanoha pointed Raising Heart right at the monster, "Lyrical Magical, Jewel Seed. Seal!"

"_**Sealing!"**_ the device chimed out and unleashed a burst of magic. While the attack hit the monster dead on, it did not seal, and instead a small explosion occurred, and when the dust settled, the monster was nowhere to be seen, instead there was only the girls' underwear and swimsuits it previously stole in its place, including Alisa's and Suzuka's.

Nanoha had to fight off a blush and keep from staring at all of the different types of underwear lying around. Sonic, on the other hand, figured he could do something productive and took the swimsuits that belonged to the duo of currently towel-draped girls and return them to her.

"That's odd… the seed isn't here, but I can still sense it's aura" Yuuno, who just so happened to be looking in another direction, thought out loud about the odd occurrence, "Could the seed still be hibernating?"

"EEEH?!" Nanoha blinked

"Anyways, we've got to hurry and find it!" The ferret started towards the direction of the aura, but only made about four steps before he collapsed hard onto the ground

"Whoa, easy there Tutorial Ferret" Sonic was the first to check on him

"I'm all right…" Yuuno may have said that, but the way his head was spinning in dizziness seemed to say otherwise, "I just feel a bit dizzy.."

"Yuuno-kun, you've used too much magic, didn't you? You've been looking for the Jewel Seeds all by yourself up until when we found you…. And you've only just recovered from your injuries so…. Oh!" Nanoha suddenly had a genius idea, "My shoulder!"

"Eh?" the ferret blinked and suddenly found himself being lifted up into Nanoha's grasp, "Wha? Shoulder?"

"From now on, my shoulder is your reserved seat" the girl declared firmly and softly placed Yuuno on his reserved seat.

"You make it sound like you're going to give him popcorn up there, Nanoha" Sonic quipped, "But wait, if he gets your shoulder, than what do I get?"

"A-ah….can I get back to you on that?" Nanoha comically paused, "A-anyways! Let's go!"

"Hai!" Sonic and Yuuno agreed as the trio quickly confronted the source of the aura

* * *

><p><strong>[Versus: Ecchi Water Jewel Seed Beast]<br>[BGM: "Paradigm Shift" Final Fantasy XIII-2 OST]**

They found the monster, or more appropriately, monsters; as the beast was dividing into multiple copies of itself and they all scattered across the pool area, searching hard for the sacred treasure that was a girl's swimsuit and undergarments. Panties, bikinis, bras, one-piece, two-piece, they were all found from some of the bags left behind by the female customers in their haste to leave.

"Grr.. there's too many of them!" Sonic groaned as he launched himself into the fray to try and take out at least some of the nuisances, "Is there anything we can do?"

"An enforcement bind is beyond your abilities…. And there hasn't been any support spells already active on you either so that can't help.." Yuuno thought out loud, "I'll have to gather them up in one place and bind them all at once."

"No good, Yuuno-kun" Nanoha quickly shook her head, "You can't do that in your condition."

"But!"

"No buts!" the girl would have none of that, "I'll try out that new spell I learned this morning in practice. We just have to get them gathered all at once and bind them, right? Sonic-kun!"

"Ma'am! Yes Ma'am!" Sonic agreed with a mock salute, "One package of lots and lots of weird water monsters gathered up in one spot, coming right up!"

Teasing, strikes, taunting, anyway that Sonic could, he gathered the attention of the water monsters that he was fighting. With his trademark speed, he ran circles around them all and made use of the water's waves to drag a majority of monsters towards a central point.

"Make an image, put magic into it" Nanoha told herself as she began to focus, the pink magic circle shined at her feet like it did earlier that morning. The magic must have been as obvious to the monster as it was to Yuuno because it started to rush right for her.

"Uh! Nanoha! The monster noticed the magic, it's after you!" The Tutorial Ferret, though pointing out the obvious, alerted the girl to the beast's upcoming attack, "Evade it with a flying spell!"

"Uh… Yuuno-kun…" Nanoha, in her best impression of her familiar, deadpanned, "You haven't taught me any flight spells yet..."

"Oh…" To say Yuuno was embarrassed would be a mild understatement, "T-that's right.."

The monster rushed quickly for the mage and ferret, intending on stopping them from getting in the way of its perverted ambition of stealing girls' underwear and swimsuits. Just before it got to them, Sonic cut right in front of it and bared its path.

"Oh no you don't" the blue hedgehog, smirking in confidence despite his size disadvantage, stared up at the beast, "You want an opponent? I'll play with you"

While Sonic did his best to multi-task in keeping the Jewel Seed beast away from his mistress as well as keeping them gathered in one place for Nanoha to come up with the appropriate binding spell to wrap them all up. From then on she'd try to seal it again.

"Binding Spell…" Nanoha said in deep concentration as she focused hard on an image ideal of the spell she wanted, once again she found the image and focused on it, "Lyrical Magical, capture and paralysis magic… RESTRICT LOCK! (she said that in English)"

Once again, Nanoha's spell was unleashed, and this time around it had much different results. Ribbons of pink mana, combined with bursts in the shape of wheels, literally collected all of the copies of the Jewel Seed monster and bound them in place with the original also held.

"Whoa!" The blue hedgehog quickly jumped out of the way to avoid getting caught up in the binding spell himself, "Good girl"

"Wow… It's completely paralyzed!" Yuuno gawked in amazement, "That's a high level spell."

"Lyrical Magical!" Nanoha called out her incantation again

Once again the sealing spell was initiated, and this time the Jewel Seed's serial number was revealed with the roman numerals "XVII"

"Lyrical Magical, Jewel Seed Serial 17, Seal!" Nanoha called out and unleashed her spell.

The monster roared in pain as the binds tightened and exploded in a huge flash of light. The monster was gone and all that was left of it were the lingerie and swimsuits it collected as well as the Jewel Seed itself. Anxious to put an end to the incident once and for all, Nanoha touched the tip of her staff to the Seed.

"_**Receipt number Seventeen" **_Raising Heart declared, _**"Sealed"**_

* * *

><p><strong>[Boss Neutralized]<br>[Jingle: "Act Clear" Sonic CD (US) OST]**

The two only had time for a short victory pose and cheer before the magic barrier set up by Yuuno had disappeared. Much to the two's surprise and relief, all underwear and swimsuits that were stolen by the monster were returned to their rightful owners as the magic that caused the incident had been dealt with.

"Well it's good that we sealed the seed and everyone's going to be happy now" Nanoha noted as she released her Barrier Jacket and Raising Heart's device mode, "We only have 4 seeds now and there's 17 left"

"Think on the positives, Nanoha" Sonic grinned up at her after releasing his own jacket, "That's one less problem to worry about and we're getting momentum on our side."

"Yeah" Yuuno tiredly agreed

"Yuuno-kun?" the girl asked as she and Sonic started back towards Alisa and Suzuka to check up on them, "Are you alright?"

"Yeah…" The ferret nodded, though deep in his mind, he pondered the magic potential that he saw from that last fight, _'I wonder about their magical senses… I can sense potential in Nanoha and Sonic that is far above my own, though I can't tell if they are either clumsy with it, or just unskilled. Either way, looking at it now, there's no way it can't get dangerous. Even though she has a familiar, he's just as impulsive and I can't help but worry that the both of them are going to get hurt. No matter what, I'll do my best to help them seal the seeds.'_

**[30 Minutes later]  
>[BGM: "Honobono" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Almost like nothing had happened, peace returned to the pool. Kyouya, who initially was confused as to what knocked him out in the Boiler Room aside from the Boiler bursting and drenching him in water. But he shrugged it off and returned to his rounds. Hopefully his moment of lax wouldn't cost him his job.

Much to the young man's shock and for reasons unknown to him; Nanoha, Alisa and Suzuka dared not look him in the eye. When they did look at him; they looked just a bit miffed at him and their faces showed that. That, honestly confused him, whatever did he do to earn their wrath?

As for Sonic and Nanoha; either he copied her or she copied him, either way, the two of them were out in the wave pool, relaxing on matching tube rings. It was quite a cute sight; and they probably only needed a can of soda or something for the finishing touches. Alisa couldn't resist the urge to take a picture of it with her phone; she'll send a copy to Nanoha later on of course.

Meanwhile with Suzuka, Miyuki and the two maids, it was all fun and games in the pool; they all had the opportunity to sit back, relax and just simply enjoy the feeling of the cool water on their bodies. The girls had also dragged Yuuno into the pool and away from his thoughts. After Miyuki, Noel and Farin had heard about the ferret's talents, they wanted to see him swim, and he did not disappoint.

"_One of these days, we really gotta ask him how he swims"_ Sonic said to Nanoha via the mindspeak as his tube softly bounced off of hers. Since the two had gotten them there was something that the blue hedgehog couldn't help but feel was missing and he had been trying to figure it out since the thought came up. Well, finally he figured out what was missing, _"Nanoha! Next time we're doing this, we are so buying sunglasses!"_

"_Somehow, I knew you were going to say that"_ the girl, with humor evident in her childish face, replied back with a cute grin, _"Although, I can't disagree…"_

'_Well, one thing's for sure'_ Yuuno thought to himself in observation of the mage and familiar, _'these two are really starting to get along well.'_

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence]<br>[Nanoha's Room]  
>[Time: 8:30 pm]<br>[No BGM]**

At the end of the day, Nanoha and Sonic had dinner with the family, where they were given quite the humorous display of Miyuki lecturing Kyouya on a few things. One of them being not to have dirty thoughts when close to a powerful jewel that may perform actions based on those thoughts; apparently she got the story from Sonic and Nanoha. In Kyouya's defense, there were a lot of girls at the swimming pool, so any guy, save Sonic, would've probably been thinking along the same lines.

After dinner, the two took turns in the bath with Sonic going first to clean up all of the chemicals, dirt and whatnot that the pool adventure had given him. When he finished, Nanoha took her turn, and for a few obvious reasons, she took a little bit more time. But it didn't matter to Sonic or Yuuno as they had a chance to use that extra time and talk a bit.

"You know, she really surprised me" the ferret, now seated in a basket on Nanoha's desk, said to the blue hedgehog about the girl, "I didn't think she would have been able to pull off a binding spell of that high level"

"I'd be lying if I said I didn't agree with you" Sonic shrugged, "But, I think she's like me in the way that neither of us give up, even with the odds against us."

"Yeah, that's true" Yuuno nodded, "In a way I kind of envy you both; When I first met you, I wasn't sure what you could do, and the first monster really hurt you, yet you still had a laugh, how do you do this sort of thing? Face danger head on and treat it like nothing?"

"It's just what I do" the hedgehog shrugged, and just at that time, Nanoha came in, her hair let down from the usual pigtails style and she was in her pajamas.

"What are you two talking about?" the girl questioned in curiosity

"My apparent lack of fear" Sonic answered honestly.

"Yeah, I'm amazed by that too" Nanoha added to that, "And today, you really surprised me. Even after all that was going on, you still kept your cool."

"What can I say?" the hedgehog shrugged, "I'm good with pressure"

"Well, we have a nice weekend ahead of us, so I think we can relax a bit" the girl brightly chimed as she started to climb into her bed, close to the end, as if to send the hedgehog a message, "I think it's best we go to sleep now so we can wake up early."

"Uh.. time out there" Sonic, quickly getting the hint, shook his head, "You're not gonna try to share that bed, are you?"

"Well I can't have you sleeping on the floor, that's even worse than the couch" the girl countered, "Besides, even though we don't know each other that well yet, I still get this good feeling that I can trust you, so please don't let me be wrong."

"Well.. I guess if you put it like that.." the hedgehog sighed in defeat and crawled in to the open space. Luckily, due to his small size and build, he could easily fit inside and not even take up half of it. With a yawn to show just how tied he was, Sonic leaned against the second pillow, "Good night…."

"Good night" Nanoha soon joined him for a long, peaceful night's sleep to put an end to the long day.

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 4]<strong>

Author's notes: Wow! Talk about long chapters, this one gets well over the 8,000 mark. Talk about a high quality gem with a lot of content.. Well, this is what happens when I use a drama cd / sound stage for basis. Get a lot of scenes and dialogue in.


	5. Chapter 5

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter of Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar. Gotten a lot of favorites and follows lately, so I'm glad that I'm getting these stories noticed. Not to be picky, but I'd like to have some constructive criticism too so I can see where I can improve. Anyways, here we go!

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City]<br>[Seishou Elementary School]  
>[Time: 2020 hours]<br>[No BGM]**

Nanoha and Sonic, both clad in their respective Barrier Jackets, stood at the front of the large school on a beautiful, well-lit Saturday night. The two of them looked like they were in a little bit of a tussle of sorts as there was some dirt and marks on their jackets. Above the two of them was a Jewel Seed that looked ready to be sealed.

"_**Standby, Ready!"**_ Raising Heart chimed, as it was ready to seal the seed.

"Lyrical Magical!" The girl declared out her magical incantation, staring at the seed, "Serial Seed 20, Seal!"

The spell did the trick, though at the same time it also made quite a bit of a light show with the streams of light flaring out from the vicinity of the school. If anyone was watching, they might have noticed, but at the time of night, that was doubtful. The Jewel Seed floated in front of the two; its roman numerals "XX" were visible in a red inscription.

The staff of Raising Heart let out a burst of steam from its head. Nanoha looked a bit exhausted from the whole ordeal as she had to lean on it to balance herself and catch the breaths she had been holding and releasing from that fatigue.

"Good work, Nanoha" Yuuno congratulated the girl, "You sealed another seed"

"Hey, whoa! Whoa!" Sonic grumbled, "Don't I get any credit for this?"

"…. Good job, Sonic…" the ferret corrected himself, and made no attempt to hide his annoyance in the tone he put into that congratulatory statement, more evidence of slight favoritism to the girl.

The hedgehog may have grumbled a bit, but made no other gestures as there was no sense in making an issue out of a non-issue. The three began their long trek home and it was on that route that Nanoha's fatigue showed more. The girl did not dismiss her staff and was actually using it to walk, drawing some concern from her hedgehog and ferret allies.

"Uh..Nanoha.." Yuuno asked in concern, "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine" she breathed out, though her tired expression said completely to the contrary, "Just a little…just a little…tired"

If she tried to say anything else, she never had the chance to as she found herself collapsing all of a sudden. Much to the amusement of Yuuno, the girl landed right on her hedgehog familiar's back. She didn't weigh too much, but the way she was positioned combined with the fact that both she and Sonic ended up face down, made the hedgehog incapable of moving.

"Hey! Nanoha! Get off! I can't move! Oy!" Sonic whined and flailed his arms a little bit. The snickering and amused expression by Yuuno made the blue hedgehog glare at him in annoyance, "Oy! Tutorial Ferret! Stop laughing and get some help!"

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 5<br>The Town is in Danger?!**

* * *

><p><strong>[Midori-ya Café: Takamachi Residence]<br>[Nanoha's room]  
>[Time: 0730]<strong>

Yuuno sat at the foot of the shared bed of Nanoha and Sonic. Both of them looked to either be sound asleep or at least trying to get another minute or two in. The bright morning sun shining through the pink curtains of the girl's bedroom windows did not help their efforts. However it happened, Yuuno managed to get the two of them back home and able to give the good news before they both slept the previous night away. Now the newly-nicknamed "Tutorial Ferret" was presented with his most difficult challenge yet, waking up the hedgehog and girl.

"Nanoha? Sonic?" The ferret called out to them, "It's time to wake up!"

"Yuuno-kun, it's Sunday…" Nanoha replied and turned over in her bed, pressing her face in the pillow, "Five more minutes"

"Yeah…" Sonic rolled right with her, "Five more minutes; we worked our tails off last night"

The ferret groaned a little bit and kept trying to get them up by calling out. They were both awake; but not so much interested in getting up and out of the bed. Finally they both rolled back over to stare at the ceiling. In doing so, they caused the ferret, who was on the top sheet of the bed, to get rolled to the side. Sonic caught that, but declined to give it any further thought; instead, he glanced at Nanoha, who was counting the five Jewel Seeds that they currently had.

'_It's been a week since we started this thing, and we've already got five seeds out of it.'_ Sonic mentally recapped, _'I think that I've gotten used to this… being bound to this girl as her "Familiar". But… I can't help but worry that all of this is taking its toll on her. I'm living off of her with this magic bond and the only thing I've been able to do is convince her to help me bug the Tutorial Ferret to give us a day off. '_

"You know what…" Yuuno let out a sigh after he freed himself of the mess of bed sheets, "You both have me convinced. It's probably for the best that you have a day off to relax. You've already collected five seeds this week"

"Two of those in the first two days" Sonic noted, "And we've dealt with the Tutorial monster, Demon dog that really disliked Alisa, some water monster with a weird interest in girl's swimsuits.."

"At any rate.. Today you WILL take a break" Yuuno noted in a declarative fashion, "Neither of you will be able to last as mage and familiar otherwise."

"Well.." Nanoha said as she finally sat up, "I guess a break today won't hurt."

"We've got something to do today as well" Sonic noted as he got up as well; though he went a little bit further and got off of the bed, "A promise or something you said that you'd keep, Nanoha?"

* * *

><p><strong>[Soccer Field]<br>[No BGM]**

As Nanoha had said and what Sonic had alluded to earlier that morning; the two of them, with Yuuno on Nanoha's shoulder, met with Alisa and Suzuka at the nearby soccer field. The girls were all in casual clothes. Even Sonic was in clothing, albeit it was a pinkish short-sleeved sports-jacket. From what the girls had explained to the hedgehog and ferret, Nanoha's father owned and coached a youth soccer team called the Midori-ya JFC. They had a 10 o'clock am Sunday game; and Nanoha and her friends had promised to show up and cheer for the team.

"Wow, we've really filled out the stands today" Shiro informed his opposite number as a coach they were around the same age and knew each other well enough, so there was a sense of familiarity between the two, "Think we should start the game?"

"Sure" the other coach agreed, "I was thinking the same thing"

The game started and Midori-ya immediately went on the offensive side, moving the ball toward their opponent's side of the field. The full crowd helped with the morale of the team. In a rather enthusiastic way, Alisa and Suzuka cheered on the team from Midori-ya.

"_So this is a sport in your world?"_ Yuuno, seated comfortably in Nanoha's lap, asked the girl and Sonic via the mind-speak, _"The way they are playing with the ball?"_

"_Yup! It's a real fun game called "Soccer" _Nanoha answered briefly

As she said that, one of the Midori-ya boys got the ball and drilled it right past the goalie and into the net, eliciting cheers from the fans from the Midori-ya side.

"_You move the ball from one side of the field to the other, points are scored when the ball makes it into the other teams net, and each goal is worth one point."_ the hedgehog added, _"But here's the real trick, the players on the field can only use their feet to advance the ball. Only the goalie, that's the kid in front of the net, is allowed to block with his hands."_

"_It sounds like a fun sport" _Yuuno commented.

Sakuradai, the opposing team, made their own drive down the field following Midori-ya's goal. The forward got the ball and attempted his shot. The ball took a high bounce off a defender's head and looked like it was a sure goal on the upper corner of the net. But a great diving defensive grab by Midori-ya's goalie saved it!

"Oh ho! Nice play!" Alisa shouted in cheer

"Oh yeah" Sonic nodded, "if that shot went through, we would've had a brand new ballgame."

"_What about you, Yuuno-kun?" _Nanoha asked the ferret-archeologist curiously, _"Don't you have sports like this on your world?"_

"_Yeah, but I'm also an archeologist, so whatever time I'm not researching in a library, I'm out on digs" _Yuuno shook his head, _"So I don't get a chance to play too often."_

"_You're kinda the same as me then, I'm not very good at sports either" _Nanoha sheepishly giggled a little bit; that thought led her to curiously glance over at her familiar, _"What about you, Sonic-kun? You seem very athletic, so I imagine you've played sports before"_

"_Actually, no, I don't play that much either" _Sonic shook his head, _"Sure I'm athletic, but I'm also short. I'll try a track race or two every now and then, but most of my time otherwise is spent napping under some palm tree or reading a book on aviation."_

The loud volume of the crowd noise kept Yuuno and Nanoha from asking for any sort of clarification from the hedgehog. The game ended rather quickly after the two halves of regulation. The final score was 2-0 with Midori-ya getting the shutout win over Sakuradai. After the game, Shiro, in recognition for the youth's hard work, offered to treat them all to lunch at the Midori-ya café.

* * *

><p><strong>[Midori-ya Café]<br>[BGM: "Eeto Desu ne" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

It may have been due to the full house of entire Midori-ya JFC soccer team leaving them little room, but the trio of girls plus hedgehog and ferret opted to eat their sweets outside. The three girls had strawberry shortcakes and glasses of juice in front of them each as they all were quite up to enjoying a sweet or two.

For some reason, though, the girls plus ferret were all staring at the blue hedgehog with exasperated expressions. It wasn't his choice of food, as Sonic had ordered exactly the same thing that they did; instead, it was a little slip of the tongue and a recent development that happened the previous day during the impromptu shopping trip.

"So, why is there an old airplane in the backyard of your house?" Alisa asked the question that came to her mind. It was a leading one, but called for as Nanoha let that slip her tongue in passing discussion.

"And it had Sonic-kun's name written on it in large letters" Suzuka added

"I was wondering the same thing." Nanoha sent a skeptical glance over at the hedgehog, "You wouldn't happen to know anything about that would you?"

"I'm not going to get out of this one, am I…" Sonic let out a defeated sigh, "Alright, might as well talk. It's mine; I picked it up yesterday from the docks and took it to Nanoha-chan's house. I had to get some help from her family to get it in the backyard because the thing was so old it couldn't start up."

"Eh!?" the trio, luckily were not eating anything otherwise that would've been a mess, cried out briefly in complete surprise, "It's yours?!"

"Don't look too surprised" the hedgehog sighed again, "The plane is an old vintage-style biplane that I found on South Island; crashed and abandoned. I've been doing my best to try and restore the old thing on my own. So far though, I was only able to repair the wings, refresh the paint job and fix the propeller. The engine's shot dead, so I can't really do anything else unless I get that fixed up."

"So, the books on aviation?" Nanoha curiously asked, implying a need for clarification.

"I wanted to see what the engines on the older model of planes are made of and see if I could build it myself" Sonic explained further, "But, when Eggman attacked, I had to put the plane project on hold."

"How'd you get it back here?" Yuuno asked, figuring if no one else would, he'd try that one.

"Well…" the blue hedgehog went on to explain how he himself got to Uminari City; through the tour service. Yesterday, as it turned out, he went back to tell the captain that he was planning on staying at the city for a while longer as he had made a few new friends and wanted to help them out on something. The captain of the tour liner surprised him with the biplane, explaining that the authorities had found it in their investigation and planned to decommission it for parts, but she "sweet-talked" them into giving it to her for an antique collection, "It was kinda obvious what got her attention about the plane… I did print my name on it."

"What are you going to do about it now?" Suzuka asked

"Probably keep trying to restore it, and might as well add a second seat to it" the hedgehog shrugged, "I figure now that it may be of some help to us in case we end up having to go outside of Uminari City in finding the Jewel Seeds"

"If you want, we could help" Alisa offered, "Suzuka-chan and I come from wealthy families and I don't think something like what you're looking for is going to be affordable under the café's budget."

"You don't have to…" Sonic tried to dissuade them, but found any further attempt in doing so blocked by Nanoha's hand in a gesture of silence.

"Sonic-kun, we're friends now" the girl, despite not having the most confidence in herself to say that, still did so, "And friends help each other out when they're needed. I'm sure my family would like to help you too, but not with most of our budget going into the café and dojo."

If Yuuno had any ideas, which he probably did considering a connection or two he had with his job as an archeologist, he didn't voice them as he preferred to keep that connection quiet until it became important. Not that he had the chance to do so anyways, as the café began to empty itself of the boys from the soccer team. Shiro had excused them for the rest of the afternoon. One black-haired boy in particular caught Nanoha's attention, though not in any typical crush fashion. It was a blue diamond-cut jewel that the boy had taken from his bag and put in his pocket that shocked her with the familiarity, could it have been a Jewel Seed? Nanoha had thought of the notion, but couldn't find a way to ask the boy as he had met up with a girl with long sandy brown hair in a blue tracksuit who looked like she could've been a girlfriend due to how fond she was of him. Before Nanoha could do anything, her father came up to her and the hedgehog.

"Thank you all for coming to the game today" Shiro thanked the group of youth, "Are you guys calling it a day? Need a ride home?"

"No thanks" both Alisa and Suzuka shook their head in polite decline, as they both had rides that were due to pick them both up in a little bit.

"What about you, Nanoha-chan? Sonic-san?" her father asked, "Do you have any plans for today?"

"I'd like to go home and rest for today" Nanoha noted

"Same here" Sonic nodded in agreement, "Tutorial Ferret gave us the day off today from training."

"I was going to go home, take a quick shower and go back to work" Shiro said his plan, "I'll walk you two home."

Meanwhile, with the boy and girl from a few minutes ago; they both walked down the sidewalk, appearing none the wise to anything that was going on, not that anything interesting was going on during their trek. As the two were only focused on their way home, a familiar blue glow and shimmer emitted from the boy's pocket.

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence}<br>[No BGM]**

Nanoha must have been more tired than she looked because when she got to her room, Sonic and Yuuno were blessed with the rather humorous sight of the girl unceremoniously plopping onto her bed in exhaustion and fatigue that may have been just a bit exaggerated.

"Nanoha.." Yuuno scolded her, "If you're going to do that, shouldn't you at least change into your pajamas first?"

The girl, displaying that her fatigue and half-awake status was no act, sat up and slowly removed her top. The ferret, freaking out in record time, quickly made a complete 180 turn so he wouldn't be seeing the girl accidentally. Oddly enough, while Yuuno was shivering in comical fear and discomfort, Sonic just shrugged and watched with barely any interest; unsure of what the big deal was or why the ferret would freak out.

"You should take a nap too, Yuuno-kun" Nanoha droned out, again half-awake as she changed, "You too, Sonic-kun.."

"Uh, sure" the hedgehog shrugged and watched as his mistress changed into her orange pajama outfit; he glanced at the ferret, again confused as to why he still had his back turned

"I'm going to sleep until dinner.." Nanoha droned out and fell face first into her pillow, her hair still tied into the pigtails she had sported since she woke up, "Oyasumi…"

With a small sigh, Sonic watched the girl completely fall asleep on the spot. For some reason that he would most definitely question himself mentally about later, he softly untied the girl's hair ties and let her medium-length hair fall down to just below her shoulder level. Yuuno, thinking that it was safe for him to do so, turned around and approached the girl. He didn't do much else other than sit there and watch her.

"As I thought.." Yuuno said softly, knowing that the blue hedgehog would be the only one to hear him, "She looked exhausted… "

"Do you think that I may have something to do with that?" Sonic asked the ferret, just as softly and he too looked at the girl in concern; he didn't look nearly as tired as she was, but he was thinking of joining her in the nap, if only to rest up "Like the magic bond thing we have is draining her more?"

"It doesn't help her, if that's what you're asking, but that's not the issue. So you shouldn't consider yourself a liability" The ferret shook his head with a sigh, "It's the magic itself; using magic that you're not used to really takes its toll. I'm surprised that you're not as exhausted for that same reason."

"I'm not going to deny that I'm having my own share of growing pains here" Sonic shrugged, "But this isn't my first adventure, only the magic is new."

"If only I could help her out more…" Yuuno stared at his feet in regret, "If only I were stronger."

"Don't worry about it, you're already helping her out enough by just being there and teaching her about this magic" Sonic said calmly and kindly, "I know where you're coming from though. It bothers me that she's feeling this toll and I can't do anything to lessen it."

* * *

><p><strong>[Downtown Uminari City]<br>[No BGM]**

Meanwhile, the boy and the girl from before stood at one end of a crosswalk. The two were side-by-side. There was a little bit of a peaceful silence between the two, and really nothing could have gone wrong. The girl turned to the boy and talked a bit as they were waiting for their turn to cross.

"You were really good today" the girl said softly, "At least I thought so.."

"Nah, I think I just got really lucky" the boy said modestly, "It helps to have a good defense backing me up"

"Still…" The girl continued on in her fondness, "I really thought you were cool"

"Aw…" the boy blushed a bit in modesty, or perhaps maybe in a bit of a crush. An idea dawned upon him to reach into his pocket. He pulled out the familiar diamond-cut jewel seed and held it out to her, "Here.. This is for you, I thought it was just an old stone, but it looked beautiful and I think you should have it.

"Wow! It's beautiful" the girl said in awe and admiration when she saw the gem glimmer a bit. She reached out to softly touch it. However, the second she did so, trouble stirred up.

The gem reacted violently and shone brightly, causing the two to scream in surprise as they were both engulfed in the bright light. Vegetation and roots started to sprout of from the ground, especially around the point where the couple stood. With nothing else they could do but squeal, they held on tight as the roots and vegetation took the form of large trees, one of them taking the boy and girl with it.

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence]<br>[BGM: "Inflexible Determination" Final Fantasy X]**

The activation of the latest Jewel Seed was the first thing that brought Nanoha wide awake from her nap as her senses went into overdrive. She quickly hopped up from her bed, changed her clothes back to the ones she was wearing at the soccer match and restyled her hair to their usual style.

"So much for the nap" Sonic grumbled and nodded to the girl as they quickly made a sprint down the stairs, alerting Nanoha's father, who was in the bath, in the process.

"Eh?" Shiro blinked and shouted out, "What's up, Nanoha-chan? What's up, did you want to come in with me?"

"Sorry, otou-san! Some other time!" the girl cried out hastily in response, "Something big just came up and I gotta go. I'll be back in a bit!"

"Alright.. Be safe" the father let out a rather defeated sigh, the context of his last question was a non-perverted one, just a father looking to bond with his daughter like they used to when she was much younger. His sigh was probably a sign that he was starting to feel is age and realize how much his youngest daughter had started to grow, "She's growing up so fast…"

* * *

><p><strong>[Nearby Rooftop]<br>[BGM: "Inflexible Determination" Final Fantasy X (continuing)]**

Quickly, Nanoha made her way to the top of the roof of a skyscraper close to her house and café. She was followed closely by Sonic and Yuuno, the former easily able to keep stride while the latter was on the beginning mage's shoulder.

"Raising Heart" the girl called out to the device as she threw the red jewel up into the air, "Onegai!"

"_**Standby, ready!"**_ The device declared and let out a burst of magic in which engulfed the girl and hedgehog together in the shared light. Instantly, their respective Barrier Jackets appeared and Raising Heart appeared in the girl's hand in the form of its Device Mode staff. Sonic's twin swords appeared in his grasp as well. Once all of that was over, the two looked at the scene before them in, well Nanoha's case, complete shock and horror.

Uminari City, at least over half of it, was a complete mess. Trees were seen everywhere, covering more than half of the buildings visible. The trees looked just about as large as some of the skyscrapers, maybe even bigger. If it could bring her some relief, the buildings that did not have the trees or roots coming out of them seemed intact for the most part.

"Uh… Yeah" Sonic shook his head a bit and softly quipped, "We're gonna need a bigger hatchet"

"This… this is horrible" Nanoha just stared at the scene in horror, most in part because she felt responsible for what happened.

"This must've been caused by a human" Yuuno explained, "If someone puts their strongest feelings and wishes into it, that's when the Jewel Seed is at its peak of power.

**[BGM Insert: "Rydia's Theme" Final Fantasy IV ost]**

"…" Nanoha let out a loud gasp in further realization and horror. Regret obvious in her expression, she stared at her feet, _'So that boy really did have a Jewel Seed… I saw it right there in front of me, and I didn't do anything about it. If I did something back then, I could've prevented this from happening!'_

"Nanoha?" Yuuno stared at the girl, he had no idea what she was thinking. To his surprise though, the girl's familiar somehow did know what she was thinking and he could read her horror-stricken expression.

"Enough of this.." Sonic shook his head and placed a firm gloved grip on her shoulder, "We are not going through a drama scene here; not on my watch."

"Eh? Sonic-kun" Nanoha just stared at the hedgehog in confusion, only to comically wince when the hedgehog lightly tugged on the closest pigtail or her hair "Uwaaaah!"

"We have more important things to worry about than to have you start doubting yourself" Sonic lightly glared at her, "Let's get this seed taken care of and we'll talk later."

"…" the girl just stared ahead again, silently absorbing her familiar's words. Her face suddenly gained a serious expression. As if reading her thoughts, Raising Heart's head glowed a bright aura of cherry blossom hue. The girl finally said something after a moment of pause, "Yuuno-kun? What should I do in cases like this?"

"Eh?" the ferret glanced at Nanoha's face, only to flinch a bit at the dead serious look on her face, "Oh.. In order to seal it, you need to get close to the seed."

"Except we can't see it.." Sonic grumbled, "Forget a hatchet, we'll need a big telescope or something!"

"It'll be fine if we find the place it sprouted from" Nanoha, serious and dead set on fixing her mistake held up her staff and pointed it right at the large tree in the middle, "Ne, Raising Heart?"

"_**Area Search"**_ The device confirmed in declaration as her master spun around in a circle, creating a large magic circle with herself in the middle of it.

"Sonic-kun, help me out here, please" the girl requested as she began her incantation, "Lyrical Magical! Search! Find the place where the growth is at its worst"

The search spell went off with a massive amount of spheres in the cherry blossom hue separate and spread out all over Uminari City. Sonic and Nanoha, linked to the spell, closed their eyes and were immediately assaulted with images of what the spheres had picked up through their vision. There was little doubt that the girl and hedgehog would most likely have a headache after it was all over. It only took less than a minute, but they found the source in the form of the boy and girl from before, cuddled close together in a defensive huddle. They were in the middle of a yellowish sphere. The Jewel Seed was right in the middle of the two.

"Found it!" the duo declared at the same

"Eh?" Yuuno blinked, "You did?! That was quick.."

**[BGM: "Paradigm Shift" Final Fantasy XIII-2 OST]**

"I'll seal it right away" Nanoha declared and held Raising Heart out.

"Eh? From this range?!" the ferret argued, "But you can't.."

"Yes we can.." the girl held her device up high, "Ne, Raising Heart?"

"_**Cannon Mode"**_ The device declared in confirmation and shifted into that mentioned mode. At the tip of the staff a large orb of mana started to form, gathering mana; the device looked ready to cast a spell high power, but there was one thing that was missing. Raising Heart, with its intelligence was quick to point out a need, _**"Familiar assistance required!"**_

"Guess that's my cue" Sonic shook his head, sheathed his swords behind his back and held out his arms with the gloved hands open slightly. As he did so, the orb in the middle gathered more power, though it didn't show in the size, it showed in the concentrated amount of mana poured in.

"Go and capture the seed!" Nanoha called out, "Divine Buster!"

With Sonic's help, the Divine Buster was unleashed. The spell took the form of a large, long energy beam and, with incredible pinpoint accuracy; it pierced the middle of the large tree, right where the two civilians with the seed between them centered in the middle. The beam engulfed them, but caused no harm at all. The Jewel Seed's serial number was shown in the Roman numeral "X".

"Lyrical Magical!" Nanoha declared her incantation, "Serial Ten! Seal!"

"_**Sealing!"**_ Raising Heart declared and, even from its wide range, shot off the sealing spell and engulfed the large tree in an explosion of pink mana. The central tree's explosion and destruction caused a chain of events that led to every other root and tree getting caught in the blast and destroyed along with the large tree.

The sun started to set and Uminari City quieted down a bit, though once again, the damage that the Jewel Seed had caused did not just disappear as cracks were all over the place, cracked concrete and steps littered the central point of where the large tree used to be. The boy and girl from before were both unconscious and the Jewel Seed, deactivated, flew from the boy's hand and up into view of Nanoha, where it then was captured and sealed inside Raising Heart.

* * *

><p><strong>[Jewel Seed Sealed]<br>[Jingle: "Zone Clear" Sonic CD (US) OST]**

"_**Receipt No X. Sealed!"**_ The device declared after the Seed was sealed. Once again steam was ejected from the vents along the side of the device's head. _**"Mode release"**_

Upon that declaration, the device returned to its standby form and, at the same time, dismissed the Barrier Jackets of Sonic and Nanoha, returning them to their civilian clothes. Yuuno just stared at the girl in awe, definitely unable to believe what he just saw.

'_Incredible! To be able to use long range magic that even I can't use'_ The ferret thought as he stared at the two,_ 'Even though she had help from Sonic, how much magical talent does she have?'_

**[BGM: "Rydia's Theme" Final Fantasy IV OST]**

In a sudden and deliberate movement that surprised both hedgehog and ferret alike, Nanoha crouched down and hugged her knees tightly. Both of them didn't miss the tears that threatened to fall from her face. The girl just sat there and let her regrets and feelings be known to the two about her mistake.

"I've caused a lot of trouble for a lot of people today…" the girl said softly, "That boy we saw, I noticed that he had one of the seeds, but I thought it was just my imagination, seeing something that wasn't there… I could've stopped it! I could've done something, but I didn't and all of this happened."

"Nanoha… You couldn't have known that this would've happened." Yuuno tried to console her, and though he got no dice, he kept trying at it, "You shouldn't look so sad. If anything, it's my fault that all of this happened in the first place."

The girl said nothing and just sat there, hugging her knees and letting her sad feelings show in her face. For her, it was a truly humbling experience; knowing that it was her mistake that caused so much trouble for everyone. It would've been completely natural and understandable for her to let the gravity of her mistake impact her hard.

Sonic, again with a sudden drive to do so; suddenly picked the girl up onto her feet and hugged her close and tight. He himself said nothing, but he had no need to do so and his feelings were easily shared in the intent alone. The familiar magic bond between the two, as one of the upsides to it, assisted the hedgehog in sharing his feelings with the contact. All Nanoha could do was return the hug with one of her own, her hand softly patting the hedgehog's back, thankfully the spines were not sharp at the time.

A little bit later, the three were on their way home when they passed by one of the recent after effects from the tree incident. On one of the sidewalks, there was a large chunk on concrete that was off the ground, no doubt leftover when the roots of one of the huge trees were there.

As they stared at the huge chunk, the three took notice of the boy and girl from before directly across from where they were positioned. The boy looked like he had an obvious limp in his step and relied on the help of his female friend to walk, but otherwise he looked fine. In fact he was joking with her a bit.

'_It's a tough feeling to know when you're the cause of someone else's suffering. This is why I want to work even harder than before now'_ Nanoha frowned at the ground in deep thought, once again she was comforted by her familiar, _'Not just for Yuuno-kun or Sonic-kun's sake. But to make sure that this doesn't happen again.'_

It would be this day that would live on in Nanoha's memory; marking the first time in her young start as a mage that she made a mistake, a mistake that led to disastrous results. If there was one thing to be thankful for, however, it was that things could have turned out much worse than they did.

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 5]<strong>

Author's note: Ah yes, this was a sobering moment indeed for Nanoha Takamachi. Writing out Sonic's reaction wasn't as tough as it may have seemed. Watching that episode and that scene, Nanoha looked like she really needed a hug there. Yes, Sonic is in clothes. Kinda going with the color scheme inspired by his "favorite" clothes in the Sonic OVA; because.. Well.. REAL GUYS WEAR PINK! DANGUMMIT!


	6. Chapter 6

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter to Sonic the Hedgehog Lyrical Familiar. Somehow… spent the past weekend into the week hit hard by my bronchial asthma.. not a good year for allergies that's for sure. I'll get through this, I usually do.. here we go!

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Time: Unknown specifically, late-night speculated]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The city at night was peaceful and quiet; the calm breeze pushed the clouds across the late-night sky. Pedestrians were rarely seen out and about on the rooftops, as they were usually found in the streets or in their cars. The quiet environment and the fact that the typical Japanese citizen would not be likely to be pattering about on the rooftops made a few of the rooftops and skyscrapers of the city as secure locations.

Taking in the luxurious view of the cityscape and the beautiful ocean alongside the coast from a high skyscraper was what looked like a 9 year old girl. Long golden-yellowish blonde hair tied into really long-twin tails, tied by black hair-ties. The girl's eyes were a blood-crimson red, but her face appeared more innocent and lonely rather than malevolent and dangerous.

The girl wore what looked like a sleeveless outfit that had a black swim-suit with an attached pink mini-skirt at her waist, opened slightly in the middle but also held by a large thick brown belt. On her feet were black pointed-toe boots with a slight rise on the back heel and long black socks that end just at her mid-thigh, making a small gap of skin visible between the socks and the miniskirt. On her hands were black full-finger gloves with yellow triangle gems on her knuckles. Maroon belt-like cords were visible on her torso part of the suit and a black cloak with a red underside topped off her outfit.

In the girl's right hand was a black pole-ax with a yellow circle where the "edge/blade" of the ax came from. There was a long, silver pole that extended out from the head of the ax that allowed for easy grip by the girl.

"This is where the Lost Logia is?" The girl asked, calmly looking over the city, "the "Jewel Seeds" as these ones are called."

The girl looked over her shoulder to a wall nearby where her apparent companion sat. The companion was a large reddish-orange furred wolf with a red jewel in the forehead being one distinguishing feature aside from her large size and imposing figure.

"Yes" The wolf answered softly, she had a tone of affirmation though if anyone would've listened hard enough, there would've been a slight hint of a sigh almost in her answer, "This is where we tracked the Jewel Seeds"

"Any possible issues we may have to deal with?" The girl asked, having detected that defeated-like sigh from her companion but put it aside to deal with later on.

"None apparently from the locals, they're all non-magic civilians from what I can sense" the wolf answered, "But, be careful, Fate. You're not the only mage here. I felt 2 mages and a familiar, and they have collected Jewel Seeds together."

"It doesn't matter" the girl shook her head, "It's only a matter of time before all of them are ours."

The wolf said nothing else. She merely shook her head, took a long look up at the moon before doing what most of the canine sort does on long nights. She let out a long howl to the moon and the night sky.

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 6<br>New Rivals for Nanoha and Sonic?!**

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence]<br>[Time: 0945]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

As usual for Sonic and Miyuki, the two looked a bit winded but felt good as they had completed another training session in the twin sword style. Sonic and the only other female sibling of the Takamachi family had finished taking their showers and found their resident ferret in the living room watching the television. Where Nanoha and Kyouya were would've been anyone's guess; but they, along with Sonic and Yuuno, had something planned and were due to leave soon.

"Catching up on your news, Yuuno-kun?" Miyuki asked the ferret

"Yeah, I wanted to gauge how bad our collateral damage was. A few of our Jewel Seeds didn't give me the chance of setting up a barrier beforehand, so there would be a fair amount of collateral damage." Yuuno noted, "And there were a few things I still don't know about before I came here as well."

"Specifically, South Island" Sonic was quick to point out, and before Yuuno could say anything in defense or rebuttal, the blue hedgehog continued, "He hasn't missed a single report on it."

"Last I heard the police still haven't come up with a clue as to what happened over there" Miyuki noted and sent Sonic a curious glance; though if she was going to ask him about it, she didn't get the chance to as Kyouya entered the room, looking like he was waiting for Nanoha to come in right behind him.

"Nanoha-chan, are you ready yet?" the older brother asked

"Sorry!" the girl called out in response, "I just need another minute or two"

"Oh? You two going somewhere today?" Miyuki asked

"Yeah, to the Tsukimura house" Kyouya answered, "Apparently Suzuka-chan invited Nanoha-chan over; Yuuno-kun and Sonic-kun are going with us as well."

"I see…" The meganeko suddenly had a look on her face that one could almost consider one of jealousy? "I suppose you're going to see Shinobu-san, ne?"

Yuuno and Sonic, feeling understandably confused, rapidly made multiple double-takes between the two. There was something between the two siblings and they had absolutely no idea what was going on.

"Well.." Kyouya looked down a bit, he probably had the feeling she would bring up Shinobu, "I figured I could at least escort them over."

**[BGM insert: "Tanoshii Kyuujitsu" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Thankfully, the older brother was saved by Nanoha, who only just walked in the room with her pigtails almost bouncing like they were animated.

"Thank you for waiting" the girl grinned cheerfully, dressed in her usual sweater and orange skirt outfit and donning a small backpack, "Yuuno-kun! Sonic-kun! Let's go!"

"Have a nice time you guys" Miyuki said as she watched them leave the house with a small wave.

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City]<strong>

With Kyouya escorting them along the way; Nanoha, Sonic and Yuuno boarded the bus that was set for the district in which the Tsukimura residence was located at. The bus route took them past a breathtaking view of the bright blue ocean alongside the coast. Nanoha took a moment to go into the mind-speak with Sonic and Yuuno about the purpose of their little trip.

"_Today we made plans to have a tea party at Suzuka-chan's house"_ the girl explained to them, _"We'll be there all day."_

"_I figured as much" _the hedgehog shrugged, then discretely gestured in Kyouya's direction, _"There a reason we're bringing him along?"_

"_He's going to see Shinobu-san, Suzuka-chan's older sister"_ Nanoha nodded then paused when she felt the questioning glance from her brother, "Eh? Um…Oh it's nothing."

The rest of the trip was spent in silence as they continued onward. Nanoha and Kyouya both looked excited in their own way while Sonic and Yuuno felt like the odd ones out, but they shrugged and figured that feeling would go away as they got used to the family and their friends.

* * *

><p><strong>[Tsukimura Residence]<br>[No BGM]**

Nanoha had previously mentioned to Sonic and Yuuno that between the trio that she, Suzuka and Alisa made; she was the only girl who didn't hail from a multi-millionaire family. That fact made her somewhat self-conscious and sometimes felt like a third wheel to them, but it also easily explained the presence of the towering 3 story mansion that they found themselves at. Yuuno was surprised by the size and, albeit a milder sense, Sonic was as well.

Politely to announce their greeting and presence without making it too much of an inconvenience, Nanoha rang the front door. It didn't take long for it to be answered by the head maid of the Tsukimura household, Noel.

"Kyouya-sama, Nanoha-ojou-sama, Sonic-san" the older maid addressed them all aside from the ferret, who she gave a slight nod to, "Welcome"

"Thanks for the invitation" Nanoha's older brother thanked the young woman

"Konnichiwa" Nanoha beamed brightly with Sonic on her right nodding politely and Yuuno, who was on her shoulder, sitting there under his cover of the innocent ferret.

The head maid guided the three plus ferret in the house and through a hall or two before arriving at the room where the Alisa, Suzuka and Shinobu, Suzuka's sister were seated at a small table. All three were in casual clothes: the casual dresses for Suzuka and Alisa and a white t-shirt and light-blue short shorts for Shinobu. The three of them were calmly and elegantly sipping tea poured by Farin, the younger of the maid, when Nanoha with Yuuno on her shoulder, Kyouya and Sonic entered led by the older maid.

"Nanoha-chan!" Suzuka stood up upon the sight of her best friend

"Suzuka-chan!" Nanoha returned the small greeting with a smile

"Nanoha-chan, Welcome!" Farin greeted the guest politely though with a little bit of a non-formal honorific.

"Kyouya!" in almost record time, though without losing any of her feminine elegance and flair, Shinobu vacated her seat and approached her longtime friend and probable love-interest, "Hi!"

"Yeah.." Kyouya just stared at her face and she stared back; both rather taken in by their gazes to focus on much else at the moment.

**[BGM Insert: "Honobono" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Noel and Farin left the room to make tea up for the expected guests. Shinobu and Kyouya also left the room to head upstairs to Shinobu's room and have their tea there. Nanoha and Sonic took to the seats on opposite ends of the table. Nanoha had to move one of the many house cats off the cushion to do so, but other than giving Sonic a rather humorous show of Yuuno getting a little unnerved by the way that cat stared at him, there was little issue.

"Thanks for inviting us, Suzuka-chan" Nanoha thanked the girl

"It's no problem. You both looked down lately and Alisa-chan and I got a little bit worried." The girl smiled cheerfully, helping Nanoha get the feeling that she was with friends who supported her, "Did something happen recently? Like with your magic?"

"Yeah…" Nanoha did look down and quickly explained what happened after they left the café with the latest Jewel Seed sealing, "Since then, I've been trying a lot harder"

**[BGM: "Hashire" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

"KYUN!" all conversation was silenced by Yuuno's ferret-like cry. The trio of girls plus hedgehog took a curious glance down to see what the ruckus was about. They were all greeted with the rather humorous, at least to the blue hedgehog, sight of the poor ferret getting chased by that same cat.

"Yuuno-kun!" Nanoha stood up and watched the chase in some concern of the ferret

"Ai! Stop that!" Suzuka tried to get her cat to stop chasing the ferret

The only two who didn't move from their spots on the table were Sonic and Alisa. The dirty-blonde haired girl just sat there as she didn't have much business in trying to stop the chase; she was more of a dog person anyway. As for Sonic, the hedgehog familiar was in an internal battle with himself to keep from bursting out into laughs over the Tutorial Ferret's misfortune. Although, if things weren't interesting enough already, they were just about to get more so as Farin, the not-so-graceful of maids, had just entered holding a tray.

"Here I am! Sorry to keep you waiting!" The girl cheerfully announced, "I've brought all of you some strawberry milk tea and cream cheese cookies."

There are several things that do not mix well there. For one, the cat and ferret chase led through the maid's legs; for two, the maid herself was, as previously stated, quite the dojikko. A cute and kind girl, but has a penchant for the clumsiness. The poor maid had to spin around so much to avoid the cat and ferret and very quickly she felt a rush of dizziness from the quick spin.

"Watch out!" Nanoha and Suzuka quickly rushed to help her out. The two girls caught on to the maid just as she was about to fall; saving not only Farin from a mess, but also saving the cookies and milk tea from getting messed up and ruined in the fall.

"Safe.." Nanoha sighed in relief and, with Suzuka's help, helped Farin keep her balance.

* * *

><p><strong>[Outside]<br>[No BGM]**

After listening to a rapid-burst of apologies from Farin, who was easily forgiven for her cute clumsy moment; the girls and hedgehog moved their tea party outback so they can all watch the numerous amount of cats that Suzuka was taking care of.

"Your house is like a cat heaven" Alisa complimented her heiress friend as she watched the cats walk around peacefully.

"That's okay" Nanoha cheerfully said, "Cats are cute. Don't you think so too, Sonic-kun?"

"Eh.. They're okay" the hedgehog shrugged.

"Thanks, though a few of them have been promised homes already, so I won't be seeing some for a while" Suzuka regretfully admitted, "But I'm sure they'll grow up to be healthy and big"

As the tea party continued in peace, Ai, the same cat that had chased Yuuno earlier, wandered around and into the forest outlying the backyard of the large mansion. As the curious cat walked through the trees, it caught sight of a blue gem that was cut like a diamond. As the cat approached it, the Jewel Seed flickered to life.

**[BGM insert: "Inflexible Determination" Final Fantasy X OST]**

That sudden flickering drew the attention of Sonic, Nanoha and Yuuno instantly and the three started to look around as if taking note of what they suddenly sensed. Alisa and Suzuka were not so oblivious and drawn in to their drinks, so they were quickly able to tell that something was up.

"Nanoha-chan?" Suzuka asked curiously, "Is something wrong?"

"Um…" Nanoha looked at Yuuno and the hedgehog, upon their nods she turned to face her friends, "We just sensed a Jewel Seed."

One more flicker elsewhere drew more attention from the magically sensitive trio. From all signs, it appears that another Jewel Seed has just been activated.

"And it just turned on.." Sonic added, "Looks like we'll have to pause the tea party."

"Can we come with you?" Alisa asked; well at least she actually asked this time around, still she and Suzuka both did not appear like they would take no for an answer, "We may not be able to help much, but in case something goes wrong we'd be able to make sure you get medical attention"

"We won't be able to stop you anyways" Yuuno sighed as he hopped off Nanoha's lap and into the direction where he picked up the Jewel Seed activation, "But please stay out of the way."

The trio of girls plus ferret and hedgehog went into the forest, anxious as to what troubles the Jewel Seed could cause this time. Because of the chance of outsiders; Yuuno had dropped the idea of possibly setting up a barrier to prevent that, but was rejected by Sonic and Nanoha. While the both of them would appreciate less interference, they both felt that setting up the barrier would put unnecessary strain to the ferret, and they were in the backyard of Suzuka's house, so the only attention they could have drawn might have been from the maids and Shinobu. Kyouya knew of their activities anyways and Nanoha trusted him to do the right thing.

A blue flash of light drew the gaze of the girls, Sonic and Yuuno. What they saw next when the flash dissipated gave a completely diverse reaction from them all. Ai, the very same cat that had a chase with Yuuno earlier, was there, only there was one thing rather different about her. She was a good 10+ times her original size. Needless to say, the three girls just stared at the cat in shock and had a few anime-style sweat drops falling from their faces in exasperation. Sonic was no different in that regard either, but Yuuno, poor ferret could only stare. He probably just saw the thing that scared him the most as a ferret.

**[BGM: "Eeto Desu Ne" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Ai, for all it just grew in size, acted like really any other cat would. It just let out a soft "meow" that was much louder with its increased size and merely just walked on peacefully, minding its own business. If anything, the only real trouble was the fact that each step the giant cat took made a shockwave with the impact on the ground.

"Uh…" Sonic was almost legitimately speechless, "You'll have to come back to me for a quip there."

"T-that's…." Alisa just stared in shock equally

"Ai.." Suzuka, for legitimate reasons, was a little bit concerned for the safety of her cat.

"That kitten had feelings of wishing to become big" Yuuno tried, albeit weakly, to explain, "And that wish was literally granted?"

"I see.." Nanoha pressed her hand to her forehead in exasperation.

"But, at any rate. It's still dangerous" Yuuno noted, "If we don't return it to its normal size soon.."

"Y-yeah." The girl nodded

"Ai wouldn't be able to fit in our house" Suzuka gave her best friend and resident newbie mage a pleading look, "please help Ai"

"Well at least it doesn't look like she'll come after us anytime soon" Sonic noted the one positive to all of this, "Unless she fancies another game of "tag" with the Tutorial Ferret"

"That didn't turn out well the first time" Nanoha shook her head and held out her device, "Raising Heart.."

Before Nanoha could give her device the order to set up, a yellow bolt of magic flew over everyone's head and hit the cat. The large cat flinched as it was hit by the bolt, but otherwise didn't appear hurt all that much, it might've been more-or-less surprised by the sudden attack.

Everyone turned to face the source of the bolt and found that it was the ax-wielding girl that was up on the rooftops the previous night; although no one there would've been able to take note of that as they hadn't seen her before. Today the girl had perked herself on a nearby telephone wire pole and had a perfect vantage point to shoot from.

"Bardiche" the girl softly spoke in command to the pole-ax in her right hand, "Photon Lancer"

"_**Yes, sir"**_ the device, apparently named Bardiche, spoke in a deep male mechanical voice, _**"Photon Lancer, full-auto fire"**_

A yellow light gathered at the tip of Bardiche's head as the girl fired rapid-fire bolts of magical light. The bolts themselves appeared to have a lightning element to them as they were fired in multiple rounds at once. All of them hit the cat and caused it to cry out again. The last set of rounds may not have hurt it as much, but these ones did.

"Ai!" Suzuka had to be held back by Alisa otherwise she might've pulled a not-so-wise move of trying to go help out her cat.

"That's magic!" Yuuno stared in shock.

"Sonic-kun.." Nanoha glanced at Sonic and they both shared a nod. In a matter of seconds the girl held out her standby form device again, "Raising Heart! Onegai!"

"_**Standby ready"**_ Raising Heart chimed in confirmation and engulfed the girl and her familiar in a light that quickly generated their respective Barrier Jackets and Sonic's twin kodachi before going to its own active form.

**[No BGM]**

Quickly, the two approached the cat, hoping they could get to it and protect it before the girl decided to let another round of her spell fire off.

"_**Flier Fin"**_ Raising Heart declared as small pink wings materialized at her master's feet. The wings allowed Nanoha to fly up onto the back of the cat with ease and haste. Sonic, quickly able to copy the spell, did so and joined his mage on Ai's back. Quickly Sonic took a defensive stance while Nanoha held Raising Heart in front of her. The device chimed out in declaration of another spell, _**"Wide Area Protection!"**_

Sure enough, another round of Photon Lancers was rapid-fired. Instead of hitting the cat, though, they were all met by a wide pink shield that covered the back of the cat. The combined magic power of Sonic and Nanoha fueling the barrier protected the giant cat from any further harm.

"A mage and familiar…" the girl softly observed, but didn't let the interference affect her emotions. Instead, she tilted the head of her own device downward and fired off another set of rounds, this time they were aimed at the cat's legs and hit their mark easily.

With the cat's legs struck, she lost her balance and fell down onto her side with her back hitting the tree next to her. Thankfully, Sonic and Nanoha were able to easily glide down to the ground and take a defensive stance in front of the large cat with Yuuno hiding in the bushes close by so he could watch. Alisa and Suzuka also took refuge behind the bushes with the ferret, despite the latter purple-haired girl's wishes to make sure Ai was okay.

'_Every day I'm surprised more by what these two can do.' _Yuuno thought to himself in observation as he watched the girl and hedgehog's actions, _'There may not be much else that I can teach them'_

**[BGM Insert: "Ketsudan no toki" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

The girl who fired the shots glided slowly and landed on the branch of the closest tree in front of Nanoha and Sonic. It was then that the two could have a much better look at the mystery girl herself. Both of them were in for quite a shock when they discovered that this girl looked no older than they were. She levelled them both with a calculating glance and glare, but had a more-or-less neutral frown on her face.

"Another mage like myself.." the girl softly, but clearly and easily understood, thought out loud, "Another person searching for the Lost Logia, or Jewel Seeds as these ones are called."

"There's no doubt about it now" Yuuno thought out loud, easily heard by Sonic, Nanoha as well as Suzuka and Alisa, "This girl is probably from my world. Not only that, but she knows the true identity of the Jewel Seeds."

"Another Intelligent Device, like Bardiche." The girl's crimson eyes glanced at Raising Heart. Then her glance was levelled once again at Sonic, locking eye contact with his green eyes, "And another Familiar as well… Like Arf.."

"Bardiche?" Nanoha stared at the girl's mentioned device, quickly comparing it to that of her own Raising Heart.

"Arf?" Sonic blinked in confusion. He looked all around him and where the girl was, but couldn't find who the girl was referring to there.

"I came by myself." The blonde explained, "As for the Lost Logia, or Jewel Seeds.."

"_**Scythe Form"**_ Bardiche declared and instantly opened up the ax-head and ran a blade of energy through it, transforming the device into a scythe that looked pretty dangerous with the mana-generated blade.

"I'm terribly sorry for this, but I will be the one to claim it" Fate backing up the apologetic tone with her soft voice easily, took a stance and in a sudden display of tremendous speed, she rushed forward to take a swipe at Nanoha and Sonic.

"_**Evasion!"**_ Raising Heart quickly declared, following up with a spell declaration as well, _**"Flier Fin!"**_

It was only thanks to that Flier Fin spell that Sonic and Nanoha were able to avoid the swipe of Fate's scythe slash. Nanoha's momentum took her to the skies while Sonic's took him toward the trees bordering the forest path. Again, unfazed by the evasion of her foes, Fate brought the still open scythe device of hers behind her and bent her left front knee but fully extended her rear right in a stance.

"_**Arc Saber"**_ Bardiche confirmed its master's silent spell command and readied itself for Fate to take a big swipe and detach the blade of the scythe. The blade was sent spinning at Nanoha much like a boomerang would've been thrown.

"_**Protection" **_Through Raising Heart's declaration, Nanoha took to the defensive again and made the blade hit her barrier in a small explosion. Nanoha had no intention of trapping herself with the barrier and she used the explosion to ascend higher up in the sky. Unfortunately for her, Fate had an advantage in speed and used that to rapidly take to the skies and clash.

"Why?" Nanoha asked as she struggled in the clash of Raising Heart and Bardiche, "Why are you doing this?"

"Even if I told you" Fate softly spoke, "It would probably mean nothing to you.."

"Oy!" Sonic's voice alerted Nanoha and Fate to the presence of the hedgehog, who had also taken to the skies. Twin kodachi blades wielded, the blue hedgehog used his own amazing speed and hoped to catch the blonde off her guard while she was busy with his own mage, "I think you forgot someone!"

Nanoha gritted her teeth, but not for Sonic's sudden appearance and she broke off her clash with Fate to give him the chance of taking an attack on the girl. Sonic had the advantage of his own speed with him and just as his surprise attack could've been a sure success, he found it blocked by Bardiche. Fate, not about to take another chance with the familiar, used the clash to break off downward back into the forest. Sonic let out a soft grunt before he went down to join with Nanoha again.

Fate, again bearing little change in her expression, touched down on a branch of another tree above the position of Nanoha and Sonic, who were once again side-by-side. She held up Bardiche as it changed forms back to its original device form.

"_**Cannon Mode"**_ Raising Heart shifted to the declared form as Nanoha held the device out and pointed it right at Fate as if ready to get a spell fired off. Sonic, taking a quick non-verbal hint from the girl and device; sheathed his twin-kodachi and also brought his palms forward to pinch in to the spell preparation, _**"Divine Buster! Standby ready"**_

"_**Photon Lancer, get set!"**_ Bardiche retorted as Fate returned the gesture and pointed the head of Bardiche right at Nanoha.

'_I'm sure she's the same age as us..'_ Nanoha observed about the girl above her and on the opposite end of her crosshairs, _'She has such beautiful eyes and hair.. But… this girl..'_

Before Nanoha could finish her thought, her attention, as was Sonic's, were suddenly shifted off of the girl as the gigantic cat woke up with a loud meow. Unfortunately for the two, their sudden distraction was a big mistake and it was one that Fate was not about to pass up so freely as a bolt of magic suddenly was generated at the tip of Bardiche.

"Oh…" Sonic was the first to realize the mistake and in addition, realize just how much it will cost, "Crap.."

"I'm sorry…" the girl spoke softly and apologetically.

"_**Fire"**_ Bardiche declared and fired off said spell at almost point-blank range. Nanoha and Sonic didn't even have a second before they were engulfed and hit hard by the Photon Lancer. The lancer not only hit the two, it also made contact with the ground beneath them and sent their limp, probably unconscious bodies up into the air and falling down.

"Nanoha!/-chan! Sonic!/-kun!" Yuuno, Alisa and Suzuka called out to the two in the air as they quickly rushed to their aid. Before the unconscious two could suffer any further harm from a bad landing with the ground, Yuuno caught them with a set of magic-generated fields that sprouted up from the ground. Alisa hoisted the unconscious Nanoha over her shoulder while Suzuka did the same with Sonic. The civilians and ferret were then forced to watch a different mage go to work with sealing of a Jewel Seed.

"_**Glaive Form"**_ Bardiche declared and its axe head flipped up by 180 degrees and extended away from the handle. Three wings of mana were released below the base, making the device look more like a glaive. With little emotion to her expression, Fate twirled her device in a show of skill and pointed the tip of the glaive form device at the gigantic cat. Lightning rushed from the tip of the device and impacted the body of the cat, making it cry out in pain.

"Ai.." Suzuka could barely watch, but she did, anxiously hoping that her cat would be alright when the sealing was done.

As the giant cat cried in pain, the Jewel Seed it had come into contact with emerged from its body and reveal itself. In red lettering, the Roman Numerals "XIV" that marked the Seed's serial number were revealed as well.

"_**Command, sir?"**_ Bardiche asked

"Lost Logia… Jewel Seed Serial XIV" Fate calmly declared the Jewel Seed's serial number and made her order clear, "Seal.."

"_**Yes sir" **_Bardiche confirmed as Fate held it upward to face the sky. A yellow stream of mana was sent upward into the sky. The stream opened up a hole in that cloudy blue sky and from that hole came countless bolt-like streams. Falling down like rain as they impacted the Jewel Seed, and its previous host through extension hard.

"_**Sealing"**_ Bardiche declared as a powerful and wide wave of yellow energy fell straight down from the hole and equally made a huge impact on the cat. A huge flash of light blocked all sight for a few moments before it dissipated, leaving behind the Jewel Seed and Ai, who was now back to her normal size. The cat groaned a little bit but otherwise, it only appeared to be unconscious.

Fate calmly walked over to the Jewel Seed and touched the tip or Bardiche, which was back to its device form, to the Jewel Seed. The Seed was quickly captured and stored inside the black device.

"_**Captured" **_Bardiche declared as it released a burst of steam

**[No BGM]**

"Ai!" Suzuka's concerned voice calling out for her cat reminded Fate that she wasn't alone. With little emotion she turned to face the ferret and the two young civilians that had their unconscious friends over their respective shoulders. No doubt they were going to get them both to a hospital, but Suzuka wanted to make sure her cat was safe and sound.

"Civilians.." Fate regarded the two softly

"W-why did you have to hurt Ai so much?!" Suzuka asked, tears falling from her face in grave concern, "S-she was only a small kitten."

"If what you did to seal that seed thing causes any really painful hurt to Ai" Alisa, royally and rightfully ticked off, glared at the other girl, "I swear you'll answer to me for making Suzuka-chan sad. As if you haven't already done enough by hurting Nanoha-chan and Sonic-kun"

"I apologize for my brash actions" Fate, softly, sympathetically apologized with a deep bow, "Your cat will be fine after some rest, it wasn't hurt that badly by my sealing."

Even with Sonic's weight on her shoulder, Suzuka easily managed to breeze past Fate and grab her kitten before going back to Alisa and Yuuno's side. The nine year old purple-haired heiress calmly sighed in relief before.

"You two are only civilians; if you do not wish to be hurt; I suggest you refrain from getting involved in this anymore." Fate warned the two sternly after allowing Suzuka to get her cat, "The same for your friends. If they do not wish for a repeat of today, they should stay out of my way and give up their own Jewel Seeds."

"Why are you doing this?" Alisa asked, "You look like you could be our age"

"Even if I told you both, it probably wouldn't matter." Fate turned her back on the group and slowly started away, "Your friends will be fine after they receive medical attention, but when they wake up; please give them my warning."

With Yuuno watching with a glare on his ferret face to make sure she didn't try anything further, Alisa and Suzuka watched as Fate made her exit in a not-so-dramatic fashion and walk away. Once the girl was no longer in sight, the two heiresses and Tutorial Ferret left the area as well and went on back to the Tsukimura residence.

* * *

><p><strong>[Tsukimura Residence]<br>[Time: 1720 (5:20 pm)]  
>[BGM: "Kono hiroi sekai ni" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

By the time Sonic and Nanoha had regained consciousness twilight had already started to descend in the afternoon sky as the sun had also begun to set. The two woke up, bandaged and a little bit sore in a bed in one of the few spare bedrooms. They were surrounded by Kyouya, Alisa, Suzuka, Farin, Noel and Shinobu.

As it turned out, during the time they were unconscious, Sonic and Nanoha were alerted to a few things. First and foremost, the fact that they were carried inside the house by Suzuka and Alisa drew understandable concern from Kyouya, Shinobu and the maids. Yuuno, making another action he would later regret further, had to bring Shinobu and the maids in on the whole magic secret as it was the only way to explain what had happened. At first the three were somewhat skeptical, after all it did come from a talking ferret, but Kyouya, Alisa and Suzuka were able to back up the ferret's story, in addition to the young girls' most recent experience. They believed the story and promised to support in any way they could. The ferret was once again reminded of how much Nanoha's friends and family cared for them, and how easily they were also able to accept Sonic and care for him as well like a friend.

The second thing they were told was that Ai, the cat that was possessed by the Jewel Seed, woke up fine and healthy. That gave some relief, especially to Suzuka, who treasured that cat like all the others she had. Fate's word held true after all. Speaking of Fate, the two were given the mentioned girl's warning, albeit she still remained unnamed to them as the girl had not given any of them her name yet. They calmly listened to the warning and no doubt will take it to heart.

"That girl" Yuuno said from the bedside in deep thought, "her clothes, device, magic.. there's no doubt in my mind that she is someone from my world."

"You think we'll meet her again as we hunt for Jewel Seeds?" Nanoha asked the ferret and hedgehog. Upon seeing them both nod the girl shook her head, "Strangely, that thought doesn't scare me.."

"There is one though that unnerves me though" Sonic said after another moment to think back on what the other girl had said before, "We saw her device, and felt her magic, but she said earlier that she was flying solo today. If that's the case, who or what is her familiar? If she was able to do this much damage to us on her own; that makes me nervous as to what her familiar could do."

The others could only nod solemnly in agreement. They were all concerned about the condition of the two, but were relieved to find that they would be much better after some rest. Still, many questions loomed over everyone's minds. Who was that girl? Why was she after the Jewel Seeds?

* * *

><p><strong>[Apartment]<br>[Later that night]  
>[BGM: "Kizuna shinjinte" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Much later at night found Fate, the girl who sealed the Jewel Seed that possessed the cat earlier that afternoon in an apartment she recently took up residence in. As she sat down in her couch against the window, the girl's wolf-familiar, Arf, walked right next to her, calmly growling in satisfaction when the girl stroked her forehead.

"There was a little bit of interference" Fate said as she petted the wolf, "But everything turned out fine."

"Did they really?" Arf asked, understandably concerned after she heard about the interference.

"The Jewel Seed, Serial 14, I captured it" Fate nodded, "I had to deal with the mage. She had a device like Bardiche and a familiar like you said."

"This will be the last time I let you fly solo on me, Fate" Arf said in a tone that gave her mistress no room for argument, "What was her familiar like?"

"He was short but fast and unlike you he doesn't transform and wields swords when he fights." The girl answered, "I wonder though... how many Seeds do they have?"

"We'll have to take them at some point. It's what we have to do after all" Arf took a brief glance behind her at a portrait on a lighted nightstand. A frown formed on her animal-like muzzle.

"We'll be alright so long as we don't stray from our path" Fate calmly petted her wolf again, following her glance to that same frame. It was a picture of what looked like the same girl when she was younger smiling alongside a tall and beautiful woman with dark purple hair, "Wait for us, kaa-san.. We'll return to you soon."

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 6]<strong>

Author's Note: Finally! After the long time coming we get the debut of FATE-CHAN! Fate finally makes her debut in Lyrical Familiar. What do ya'll think? I think I portrayed her pretty fair here.


	7. Chapter 7

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter of Lyrical Familiar. Hope everyone enjoyed the debut of Fate in my previous chapter, I tried being somewhat correct in the anime and movie canon, while at the same time, not quite play Fate out as a true "villain" because she really isn't; even if she was a bit harsh. Here we go!

* * *

><p><strong>[Dream Sequence]<br>[POV: Nanoha]  
>[Local Time: Unknown]<br>[No BGM]**

To say that Nanoha Takamachi had a lot to think about over the past few days would be an understatement. Not only that, but what she had to think about brought to her a sobering feeling. As a matter of fact, for her; her life had taken a drastic change over the past few weeks. She was supposed to be just the ordinary third grade schoolgirl, but it all changed one night. When she met the talking ferret; when she became a mage and saved the life of the blue hedgehog, making him her familiar in the process; when she gained her magic powers, all of that changed her life.

Since then, she saw the ferret as a friend and tutor-like figure for her; while for the hedgehog, she saw him as a brother. A question lingered in her mind as she pondered; some words and feelings couldn't be so easily connected, but was fighting the only way to connect them? Her latest sequence of thoughts reflected on her recent experience, the other mage she briefly met and was defeated by.

'_I'm sure that our meeting was just a coincidence.' _Nanoha appeared lying down, dressed in her elementary school uniform. In her dream-like state slumber, she was able to think about that experience, _'But if you layer all of the coincidences of the world on top of one another, I'm sure that people pick one of them and it becomes a path that they travel on.. At least that's how I believe._

'_My life, I believe, started with a coincidence like that.' _Nanoha, still within the depths of her dreamscape and well deep in thought, opened her eyes. Her clothing changed from the school uniform of her elementary school to her Barrier Jacket with Raising Heart appearing in her left hand, _'That's why I feel like I want to continue going on like this, believing that I've made no mistakes.._

'_Of my own free will'_ Raising Heart shifted into its Canon mode and the three strike flame wings appeared just under the device's head, _'And with my own feelings..'_

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 7<br>A town of hot water; the Uminari Hot Springs!**

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[En Route to the Hot Springs]  
>[Local Time: 10:15 am]<br>[BGM: "Tanoshii Kyuujitsu" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

For Japan, there comes an annual time where a series of consecutive holidays; usually starting with Showa day on May 29th are celebrated. This time of the year is known as the "Golden Week" and it is the longest period of vacation time for most Japanese jobs. For the Golden Week, most businesses and companies are closed down and their employees receive paid time off.

While the Midori-ya is technically exempt from the Golden Week, the fact that the café has other employees than just the Takamachi family allows the family to take the week off and go on a huge family vacation. They've got plenty of workers who are more than happy to fill in.

For this Golden Week vacation, the Takamachi family was taking on a few more additions. The Tutorial Ferret Yuuno Scrya, Sonic; Nanoha's familiar, Alisa and Suzuka; said girl's best friends and Suzuka's maid's; Farin and Noel; last, but not least by any margin if one were to ask Kyouya, Shinobu Tsukimura; all were allowed to tag along.

Two cars rode behind one another on the highway. The first carried Nanoha, Sonic, Alisa, Suzuka, Yuuno, Miyuki and Shiro and Momoko Takamachi while the second car trailing them had Shinobu, Kyouya and the maids inside. Their destination of this vacation was the Hot Springs in Uminari City where they would spend two nights relaxing at the spa and washing away all the pains and drama of the world if only for a few days.

As relaxing of a vacation it would be for everyone else going, it couldn't have been needed by anyone more than Nanoha Takamachi. As much as she and her familiar tried to hide it, nobody who knew about it could've missed the "down in the dumps" demeanor she was in as of the past week. It had been a week since the encounter with the mysterious black-clad mage and they hadn't been able to find a Jewel Seed since.

All that said; there was little argument from the family and friends, who know about her recent responsibilities and try their best to be supportive, to take this small vacation and just wind down. Nanoha, along with her familiar were admiring the view of the passing scenery from the car window when Yuuno spoke aloud.

"Nanoha, Sonic" the ferret, though he probably didn't "need" to do so as he had Alisa and Suzuka who could've done the same thing, reminded the two of an obvious tip, "We're all on vacation, so take it easy and slow."

"I know" Nanoha gave a small smile to the ferret, "I'll be fine."

"Ne, Sonic-kun" Alisa, taking the opportunity to talk to said blue hedgehog, had a slight curious question for him, "Have you ever been to an onsen before?"

"Uh…" The hedgehog had to think about that one for a second, "I travelled through some ancient ruins with lava and an ancient, underwater labyrinth maze in the same day. Does that count?"

"I don't think so.." Suzuka shook her head while Nanoha giggled a bit. There was certainly no shortage of skepticism from the girls and ferret; though the one who had the most disbelief was the latter ferret.

"What kind of a world did you come from where you had to go through things like THAT?!" Yuuno gawked out; even though he may be a dimension/world hopping 9 year old archeologist, he had a tough time swallowing the idea that the talking blue hedgehog could have gone through what he just described and still hail from this same world.

"There's a lot of different terrain on South Island alone" Sonic, unfazed by the disbelieving looks, shrugged, "You'd be surprised at what you could find if you take the time to look for yourself. Ancient ruins, lush green hills, beautiful and peaceful urban environments; it's all there."

"And you've seen all of that in one day?!" Yuuno asked, his fascination over hearing about what he believed to be the hedgehog's homeland growing; several things clicking in his head, "Wait… if that's true then you do know about what's been reported in the news. What could've happened that made you have to go so far in just one day?"

"I don't want to talk about it." The hedgehog shook his head and stared out the window again with his muzzle resting on a gloved soft fist, "Sorry to disappoint you. I know what you've been trying to ask me since you've heard about it, but I'm not comfortable talking about it yet. Not just with you, but with everyone else here; because, to be honest, I'm still getting over it myself."

"Alright, that's enough! This is a vacation and we're going to the spa to have fun and relax! " Alisa, looking to break up a negative atmosphere that would've ruined the relaxing intent of the vacation in the first place, cut the small exchange short with her outburst, "This is a vacation and we're going to a hot springs spa! We're going to let loose and have fun!"

It didn't take long for the drive to finish and everyone to arrive at the Hot Springs spa. One of the biggest ways for a Hot Springs spa to make a great first impression on those who haven't been there before would be location; and, being situated in a beautiful forest with the backdrop of the mountains impressed Sonic and Yuuno a bit.

The cars parked next to one another and everyone checked in before splitting up into groups that were technically divided by gender. Ironically, only Shiro and Kyouya were the lone males to go into the designated male changing room and attached bath. Sonic and Yuuno were not so lucky and they found themselves dragged, albeit the hedgehog was the only one dragged while the ferret was held, into the female section.

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari Hot Springs]<br>[Female Bath]  
>[BGM: "Eeto desu ne" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

For the lone two males who shared the misfortune of being dragged into the female bath changing room, neither one of them could say that they were particularly comfortable. Sonic was able to somewhat endure it for now as he was somewhat innocent and had yet to come around to separate how he regards females and males of the human species. Yuuno, for reasons unknown to all but himself, looked quite uncomfortable and tried really hard to avert his gaze and stare at the wall of the cubby he was seated in next to the basket that Nanoha had while she changed.

"Yuuno-kun" Nanoha, oblivious to Yuuno's discomfort, asked the ferret, "Have you ever been to an onsen before?"

"Well um.." the ferret, still with his back turned away, "If you count a public bathhouse as one then yes.."

"Onsens are so much fun…" There was a certain, jovial tune to Nanoha's statement that drew a curious expression from Yuuno that had him turn around to take a small peek; one that he would probably regret later.

Yuuno and Sonic, who already had the equivalent of a front row seat already, watched a rather humorous sight as the girls, with the exception of Nanoha, decided to have a little fun in stripping out of their casual clothes. Shinobu and Suzuka took it casually and let it not be said that the differences between a pre-teen girl and a mid-to-late teenage girl weren't so obvious. Because they were as obvious as Shinobu's nearly full-developed chest bursting out of the black lace lingerie as compared to her little sister's yet-to-be-developed one. Yuuno, who was already blushing red and uncomfortable from going into the bath alone, started to fidget as said blush grew a darker shade of red. Sonic, on the other hand, had a little bit of a more interesting reaction; all he could do was stare at the scene with a slight tilt of his head as if he was on the brink of discovering something.

Alisa, grinning like the perverted mischief-lover that she was slowly growing into; fulfilled a task of metaphorically taking out two birds with one stone. She pounced on a naked Miyuki Takamachi and fondled the girl's breasts. Said teenager, not one to let such an act go "unpunished" got her payback in the form of pulling down said dirty-blonde's panties. Yuuno's comical discomfort and reactions, though only noticeable by Sonic, were furthered. The blue hedgehog wasn't quite as uncomfortable again and the majority of girls were able to see his reaction. There was nothing perverted about said reactions, oddly enough; his subtle innocent and curious demeanor.

That innocence put a diverse of thoughts through the girls' minds. Alisa and Miyuki saw the potential of having some fun with that innocence in the future, while Suzuka and Shinobu were merely thankful that they couldn't see the hedgehog grow up to be some perverted deviant. Nanoha, though, felt a slight mix between the two: on one hand, she could tell that even though it may be a month or two technically, she was still slightly older than her familiar and could see a learning experience for him; however, if exposed to too much too early, the experience could not only affect him negatively, but her as well.

"N-Nanoha.. I r-really think.." Said girl was pulled from her musings of the reasonable idea of seeing Sonic as a slightly younger brother by Yuuno's soft voice getting her attention. When she turned to face him, unintentionally flashing her naked and growing body in his direction, she could see the ferret really freak out and fall to the ground rather comically as he somehow formed a sentence, "I think I'd better go into the boys bath with Shiro-san and Kyouya-san."

"Huh?!" Nanoha really didn't see what the big deal was with Yuuno; if she only knew, "It'll be fine. Let's go in together."

The defeated fidgets from said ferret drew yet another curious glance from Sonic. That clued him in that there was something about the Tutorial Ferret that he had been holding back. Not one to make it an issue in front of the other girls who were oblivious to the discomfort and fidgets, the hedgehog merely put the though in the back of his mind and made a mental note to ask about it later.

**[BGM Insert: "Honobono" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Yuuno's discomfort was calmed down a bit when the girls all walked into the spa with towels clad on their bodies. Sonic couldn't help but feel impressed and in awe about how relaxed he felt already and they had yet to do anything in the spa. The warm, moist atmosphere created from the steam that came from the large but shallow pool of warm water easily put some tense muscles to ease.

Before the girls plus ferret and hedgehog could hop into the spa pool, they first went over to a small shower area so they could all soak up and wash themselves a bit. Suzuka offered to wash her older sister's back while Nanoha did the same with her own sibling. Before Sonic and Yuuno knew it, they were dragged over to Alisa Bannings.

"Then I get these two!" the dirty-blonde grinned a bit as the two made no effort to hide their slight feelings of discomfort. It didn't help that Alisa decided to tease them further, "Don't worry! I'm good at washing and I can handle two at a time."

Other than that, it was all relaxation and sighs as the hot springs worked their magic and put everyone's minds to ease. For Sonic, who had never been to a spa before, could honestly say that he enjoyed the relaxing feeling he got from the warm water against his tense muscles and quills. As he, Nanoha, Alisa and Suzuka were still kids at the age of 9; they had to be careful as they were advised by Shinobu and Miyuki not to stay in the spa too long.

* * *

><p><strong>[A little bit later on]<br>[No BGM]**

Nanoha, Alisa, Suzuka and Sonic, clad in matching pinkish yukatas, explored around the building complex of the spa, debating on what they could do. With Yuuno comfortably riding Nanoha's shoulder, they all traded ideas. There were so many things they could do: Ping pong, souvenir shopping; more exploring. As they were trading ideas, little did they know that someone was watching them, and that someone was about to show up.

"Hi~ Little girls!" an unfamiliar voice called out to them in a chipper, almost sing-songlike way as the source of the voice was right in front of them all. The voice belonged to another girl who looked to be not only taller than the three girls, but also older if how her body was of any clue. Curves, endowment, she was quite attractive and looked no older than her mid-to-late teen age. She had reddish-orange hair, bluish eyes and a small red gem in her forehead.

The three girls plus hedgehog and ferret stared at the tall girl and she returned the favor. It did not go unnoticed by Suzuka and Alisa that her attention was more on Nanoha than them. To their surprise, the girl kept walking towards them until she was up close to Nanoha. She was to the point where she could kneel down and put herself at Nanoha's eye level; which was exactly what she did.

"Oh so it was you two.." The unknown girl said to Nanoha and Sonic after a quick, small glance at the blue hedgehog, "You're the ones she was talking about."

"Eh?" Nanoha just blinked in confusion, who was this girl?!

"Can we help you?" Sonic asked in some form of a slight quip.

"Hmmm.. Neither of you seem like much of a problem" The young woman said in observation, "You seem like a little runt to me, girl. And you're taking a little risk, aren't you, hedgehog?"

"Okay time out, I think I know who you are and who your friend is and magic isn't much of a secret with us" Sonic said with a flat look in the young woman's direction, "I assume you're with that blonde girly in black we saw last week?"

"Aren't you a smart one? She did tell me about you so I figure I'd come and look for myself who our "rivals" could be.." The woman, not really seeming to care about if the civilians knew or not, they saved her the trouble of having to privatize her message through the mind-speak method, "This was just a simple greeting, however I'm going to warn you in advance"

"Warn us?" Nanoha, very confused, asked in hopes of some explanation of sorts, "What do you mean?"

"Little kids should be good ones and play elsewhere" the woman said with a rather obvious smirk that displayed a few subtle fangs in her teeth, "And if you don't, you're just cute enough for me to swallow up whole."

The woman patted Nanoha's shoulder a bit before letting out a loud chuckle and walk off in another direction, excusing herself to go take another bath, or at least that was what she said. The girls plus hedgehog and ferret, all stared at the retreating figure of the woman as she left them. Sonic probably would need to get his eyes checked, because he could've sworn that he saw a large wolf-like tail pop out from the woman's rear, but it disappeared as quick as it had appeared.

"That girl.. who does she think she is?!" Alisa gritted her teeth in frustration, "Threatening our Nanoha-chan and Sonic-kun like that!"

"Alisa-chan" Suzuka tried to cool off her hot-headed friend, "Calm down."

"I wonder if she's connected to the girl in black we met last week" Nanoha, looking back in memory, thought out loud.

"Probably is" Sonic shrugged, "She knew about us and said something about competition."

"We better be careful" Yuuno urged them all in caution.

* * *

><p><strong>[Spa bath]<br>[No BGM]**

As it turned out, the woman did go to the pool area and sit by an edge, allowing only her legs to enter the warm water. However, although she was the lone woman in the bath, rest and relaxation weren't the only reasons to be there. As she was alone, as far as she knew, her location was secure.

"_Ah~ Moshi, moshi~ Fate? Arf here" _The woman, identifying herself as Arf, not-so-coincidentally having the same name as the large wolf that the blonde girl was with earlier.

Elsewhere, the blonde girl, clad in black, but girly clothing, laid against a tree branch with only the pole-ax device in her grasp. She opened her eyes when she heard that familiar call, _"Yeah?"_

"_I met with the two you told me about just now" _Arf, relaxing in her spa, sighed as she reported in the mind-speak.

"_I see.."_ Fate's voice was calm and neutral, _"And what did you think?"_

"_They didn't look like a big deal to me"_ Arf reported, _"They don't seem like major enemies that we should worry about."_

"_Is that so?"_ Much as she would like to believe that, Fate didn't appear to be quite convinced, yet she reported news of her own, _"I've made some progress here too. I've been able to pinpoint the general area of our next Jewel Seed. With luck, we should be able to capture it by tonight."_

"_Nice Fate! I wouldn't expect any less from my master"_ Arf was very much ecstatic to hear that, _"This spa sure is relaxing, are you sure you don't want to join me here?"_

"_N-no t-thanks" _Arf didn't need to be near her master to tell that she was blushing from the thoughts her offer brought to her, _"I'll um.. see you tonight"_

"_Hai~"_ the woman cut the mind-speak call short and leaned back against the windowed wall to relax. In doing so, not only did her ample chest bounce despite being covered up by the towel, but a pair of wolf ears sprouted up from her head. Embarrassed and glad that nobody else was watching, the woman held her hands to the furry ears and tried to push them back in, "Oh, they came out!"

* * *

><p><strong>[Later that night]<br>[BGM: "Ketsudan no toki" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Nightfall soon descended on the complex, and, fittingly to the relaxing atmosphere; the night was calm and peaceful, a fine way to start the end of a day. The kids, under the watchful eye of the young maid Farin, were all nestled up in futons on the wood floor. After making sure that they were all off to dreamland, the young maid softly and quietly closed the door.

"Are they all asleep" Momoko asked softly.

"Hai" the young maid nodded

"Arigatou, Farin-chan" the woman softly thanked her

"Iie.. I enjoy doing things like this" the maid said in a bashful quality.

Meanwhile inside, the maid was only 3/4ths of the way correct. While Alisa and Suzuka were sound asleep, Nanoha was not so much. She had a lot on her mind still, especially after the recent encounter with that mysterious woman and her warning-laced threat.

"_Yuuno-kun?" _Nanoha reached out to the Tutorial Ferret in question, _"Are you awake?"_

"_Hai.."_ Looks like the ferret couldn't get much sleep either as he poked his head out from Alisa's sleeping futon

"_If that woman is connected to that girl like Sonic-kun thinks she is.."_ Nanoha noted, still in mindspeak as she was careful not to wake her other two friends, _"We could have a situation like before.."_

"_Hai.." _The ferret lowered his head down in regret again. Regrets seem to have been plaguing him a lot lately, and last week's events added to that, _"Say.. Nanoha.. I've been doing a lot of thinking since then.. and.."_

"_Stop! If you say another word, I'll get mad" _The girl softly patted the ferret on the head, _""I think it'd be best if I worked alone, I shouldn't have gotten your or Sonic involved in the first place, and I don't want either of you two involved anymore" That's what you want to say, isn't it?"_

"_Hai.."_ Yuuno could not deny that. Nanoha, much to his surprise, only gave a calm, honest smile.

"_Gathering the Jewel Seeds; at first it was just to help you out… but it's different now"_ Nanoha let her honest feelings and thoughts be known to the ferret, as she softly held him up with a serious look to her face,_ "Now I'm doing this because I WANT to do it and I think Sonic-kun feels the same too. If you say that you'll do it on your own and leave us behind, we'll both get really angry."_

"_Yeah.." _Yuuno looked down and away.

"_Oy oy.. could you two keep it down?" _Sonic's voice surprised them both, and one glance in the hedgehog direction showed that Sonic was awake, and had an annoyed look on his face as if someone had woke him up, _"Some of us are trying to sleep in case, I don't know, we could get some trouble."_

"_Sorry, Sonic-kun.." _Nanoha tried to apologize to her familiar, who she almost could see as a younger brother figure, _"How long were you awake?"_

"_Long enough to ask how in the world did you know what I was thinking when our Tutorial Ferret was contemplating jumping ship and hogging the fun for himself"_ Even in mind-speak, the hedgehog doesn't hide his cynical side.

"_I can't really explain.." _Nanoha, in all honesty, shook her head, _"I just felt something. Maybe it's just this magic that allows you to be my familiar, but I can feel your feelings and thoughts."_

"_Yeah, me too.."_ Sonic nodded a bit,_ "I can feel your emotions too sometimes.."_

"_I know how you feel when Yuuno-kun asks you about South Island too.."_ the girl looked down at the ground, as if reluctant to admit something else, _"I could also see your memories with those emotions when we're dreaming in our sleep.. Ano... I didn't mean to intrude.."_

"_Can't be helped"_ The hedgehog shrugged slightly, _"I trust you enough, so I would've told you sooner or later. Still, you should know why I'm not comfortable enough with talking about it with anybody else yet."_

"_Yeah.. I understand" _Nanoha nodded with a small smile, _"You'll come around soon though, I can feel that much. Until then, Yuuno-kun, please stop pestering Sonic-kun about his past until he feels comfortable enough with telling us."_

"_H-hai.."_ the ferret nodded and looked at the ground, _"I'm sorry"_

"_It's fine.." _Sonic shook his head and turned to return to his futon and resume his sleep, _"Can we all get some sleep now? I have a sinking feeling that something big is about to come up and you know how much I hate being right."_

"_No you don't" _Yuuno deadpanned as he crawled back into Alisa's futon to sleep while Nanoha mentally giggled and returned to her futon to get some rest.

"_Touche"_ Sonic was the last to fall asleep.

**[BGM: "Inflexible Determination" Final Fantasy X OST]**

It didn't take long for the next Jewel Seed to reveal itself. This one originally laid in a patch of grass overlooking a small stream near the complex where the hot spring spa was. It was just the slight shifting of the wind that pushed this seed over the patch and soon into the water. As the Seed went into the water, it activated itself and a flash-like stream of light signified that activation. Needless to say, it drew some attention, not only from Fate and Arf, who were already en route to where the seed had revealed itself, but also their de facto rivals.

Nanoha, Yuuno and Sonic all woke up almost simultaneously; they were all quite startled by the sudden outburst of magic that they had felt. Needless to say, they were all quite quick to change out of their yukatas and into regular clothing in preparation for the upcoming situation.

After having a quick run in with her parents and explaining their sudden start, Nanoha and Sonic, with Yuuno riding the girl's shoulder, bolted out of the spa complex and tried to get to the scene of where they felt the surge of power. In anticipation of a rumble and a run-in with their new "rivals" the mage and familiar changed into their Barrier Jackets.

"You're going to counter me when I say this, but I don't care" Sonic said as they ran, "I hate being right!"

"You choose to say that while we're running full speed towards where the latest Jewel Seed activated itself" Yuuno did counter that.

"You two.." Nanoha sighed slightly

Unfortunately, even with all of the speed that Sonic could muster, they weren't able to get to the source of the activation on time. To their credit, they arrived just as the mysterious blonde had sealed the Jewel Seed, in which the Serial number they could not read from the angle they had.

They could tell that Fate was not alone as the woman from before was right next to her, only she had what appeared to be wolf ears and a tail in the same color scheme as her hair. Her outfit was a skimpy white top and pink short-shorts with a black cape, red belt-like garters, black gloves and black shoes. The outfit made a slight pinkness grace Nanoha's cheeks for 3 reasons: a: it was skimpy, b: it was skimpy, and c: it was skimpy. Let it not be said that the woman didn't have skimpy tastes in clothing. The woman, fittingly enough, noticed them already.

"Ara, ara, ara, ara, ara, ara.." The woman droned out in a not-so-innocent tone that shocked all three of them when they started connecting the dots; though Sonic's surprise was more toned down for some strange reason, "Didn't I tell you earlier to be good little kiddies and stay out of the way?"

"Good little kiddies haven't had to live through what I went through" Sonic shrugged, his hands holding the twin kodachi weapons he honestly could say that were growing on him, "It'll be over 50 years before you can intimidate me, wolf-lady!"

"That Jewel Seed! What are you going to do with it?!" Yuuno questioned the duo, "It's dangerous"

"Ah.. who cares?" the woman shrugged ever so uncaringly, "I don't see any reason to tell you."

"Heh.. I bet you don't even know why you're collecting them" the blue hedgehog had a confident smirk as he tried to get under the wolf-woman's skin a bit, "I'm right, aren't I?"

"Watch it blue boy, all I said was that I don't see any reason to tell you anything that we know. And it'll take even longer than 50 years before I fall for such an unoriginal trick like the one you just tried." Arf countered once more, fully turning to face the trio of Sonic, Nanoha and the Tutorial Ferret, "I think I was being pretty nice when we talked before, wasn't I? You know when I said that if you weren't good kiddies that I'd swallow you whole"

Before their very eyes, Sonic, Nanoha and Yuuno watched as the wolf-lady, Arf, shapeshifted her form. Fur sprouted all over her human form and her hands and feet turned into paws with sharp claws In no time at all she transformed into a huge wolf that had a rather imposing figure and aura about her.

"Well.." Sonic blinked, slowly raising his blades upwards, "Can't say I saw this coming."

"As I thought.." Yuuno said with a serious demeanor, "That woman is a familiar"

"Eh?! Familiar?" Nanoha blinked, staring slightly in awe at the wolf, "Like Sonic-kun?!"

"That's right! I'm a magical beast, created by her. In return for being allowed to live through her magical power, I will protect her with my life!" Arf said as Fate came into view right behind her, "But of course you probably knew that already as you have one of your own, and if that's the only form he has, I'm honestly disappointed."

"Hey! I'm about 10 times cooler of a Familiar than you'll ever be." Sonic countered with a grin, "Why don't you put your yen where your muzzle is?"

"Fate, why don't you go on ahead? I'll be right behind you" Arf took a protective stance in front of her mistress.

"I will…" Fate nodded, "Please don't be reckless."

"Okay!" With that, Arf took a mighty leap and let gravity pull her down, aiming to body slam right on top of the trio and crush them with her large form. Her efforts were halted by a barrier spell conjured up by Sonic the Hedgehog, who was quick to take a defensive tank stance in front of his own mage.

"Oy, Nanoha, why don't you go after the girl?" Sonic said with confidence, "Tutorial Ferret and myself can handle little lassie here!"

"Hai" Nanoha nodded in agreement.

"Do you really think I'll let you?!" Arf asked as she scratched the barrier with her claws, doing some, but not too much damage to the structure.

"You don't get a choice as you're about to go for a little ride!" The hedgehog smirked as he suddenly dismissed the barrier and take the huge wolf by surprise with an instant tackle that had his Super-Peel-Out dash fueling the speed, but also the quick-loop that he sped around Nanoha and the ferret's position that allowed him to set up for that dash-tackle. Needless to say, he sent the wolf, along with himself and Yuuno, who was frankly holding on for dear life on the hedgehog's shoulder, a long ways away from the bridge that Nanoha and Fate stood on.

**[No BGM]**

"Knowledge of barrier spells and with speed that can complement what he can do" Fate admitted some praise for her rival's familiar, "You have a strong familiar."

"Sonic-kun isn't just a familiar.." Nanoha corrected, holding out her Raising Heart, "He's a close friend and like a little brother to me"

"You're as close to your familiar as I am to my own" the girl noted in some observation, she took more notice to the fact that Nanoha hadn't made her move yet, like she was patiently waiting, "So.. what are you going to do then?"

"Isn't there some way we can talk this over?" Nanoha asked, really reluctant to fight someone she barely knew, even if she was supposedly a rival to her as a mage, "A way we can avoid fighting?"

"My goal is to collect the Lost Logia fragments.. the Jewel Seeds as they're called" Fate shook her head, "And if you share that same goal, then we will be enemies, with the Jewel Seeds at stake."

"That's exactly what I mean!" Nanoha argued, "Isn't there a way that we can just talk this over, reasonably, before we have to do anything drastic like having to fight each other."

"Simply talking.." Fate shook her head, "Words alone won't change anything.. nothing will be transmitted!"

* * *

><p><strong>[Nanoha vs Fate  Sonic vs Arf]  
>[BGM: "Yuzurenai Omoi" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

In a huge burst of speed that caught Nanoha completely off-guard, Fate was already behind Nanoha, ready to take a big swing at the girl with Bardiche. Nanoha just barely was able to avoid the attack. Almost immediately, she took to the skies, aided by her Flier Fin spell. It took no time for Fate to pursue the white-clad mage.

"But.. even then.." Nanoha tried to reason more, but Fate cut her off with an ultimatum.

"Put yourself on the line and we'll make a bet" Fate offered; her terms were on the conservative side to start, "One Jewel Seed for the winner."

"_**Photon Lancer"**_ Bardiche declared in its metallic male voice, _**"Get set!"**_

Nanoha, realizing that Fate meant what she said and that there was little more she could do to avoid the inevitable battle, pulled up in her flight to allow Fate to get in front of her. Strategically, it would allow her to ideally keep the blonde within her sights so that she wouldn't be caught by surprise again.

While their mages were out in a clash with one another, the familiars were in a little clash of their own; albeit it was as close of a "clash" as it was a dead-run pursuit of her blue hedgehog opposite number by Arf. The wolf familiar would've been lying if she said that the hedgehog's speed didn't impress her greatly; she'd just prefer that said speed wasn't used to give her a rough time.

"Why don't you stop running!?" the wolf shouted out to the blue hedgehog in his samurai-themed Barrier Jacket, "Make it easier for me to catch you! Wolves are higher on the food chain than hedgehogs and ferrets, but I promise that you'll be seasoned quite well and cooked right before being eaten by such a beautiful wolf like myself."

"Two things!" Sonic shouted back, "One: Only I'm allowed to make ferret jokes with the Tutorial Ferret! Two: Food Chain? Really?! That one's so unoriginal!"

"Your mistress is a mage strong enough to create you, why are you two here?!" Yuuno, safely riding the hedgehog's shoulder, countered with a question, "How do you know about the Jewel Seeds?! Why are you after them!?"

"Shut up!" Arf took a huge leap when she saw the opportunity and clearing to do so. Sonic, who had to stop for a moment to figure out where he could cut through in the forest next, almost got pounced on by Arf; it was only his superior agility and short size that allowed him to just avoid it.

Sonic, able to keep his firm footing from that agile leap, aimed to counterattack with a double-kodachi slash. His attack never made contact as a barrier, generated by Arf's magic, appeared and protected her from the counter. There wasn't much the hedgehog could do about it other than back off. He didn't let up for much long and immediately went back on the offensive with his innovative spindash and sword combo. The barrier still held strong despite the power boost generated from the spindash's momentum and fierce speed. The lack of any real progress or advantage for either familiar put the two of them at a stalemate.

"You're not too bad" Arf said, wincing a bit as she felt a good bit from the force of the hedgehog's improvised attack on her shield spell, "That's the only form I've seen you use, and you make the most of it.. Is that your only form?"

"Beg pardon?" Sonic couldn't help but tilt his head slightly; having the need for answers, he turned to the trusty Yuuno, "Oy.. Tutorial Ferret, elaborate please"

"Hai.." Yuuno said with a slight pause, "What she's referring to is the shapeshifting ability. Almost all familiars have it as they usually gain a humanoid form when they are made. Like you saw with this one, her humanoid form came with the ears and tail leftover from her original form. Though these features can be easily hidden should the need arise."

"I'm surprised that I haven't seen a human form from you" Arf noted, "You should've gotten one when you were made; not that I really care."

"I wasn't made…" Sonic glared at the wolf, "And I don't really care now about other familiars, I wouldn't be caught dead as a human if I can help it. I like my cool, true blue hedgehog self; thank you very much. This was how I was born, and I'll be kicking and screaming before I let anyone try to change it!"

'_He still has those trust issues'_ Yuuno shook his head, _'Although I can't help but wonder why.'_

"Ara, ara, ara, aren't we feisty?" Arf grinned toothily; slowly readying herself for another go around, "I like that; you'll really make a good meal, it's always the tough fighters that taste the best."

"Yeah, sorry" Sonic readied himself in a defensive stance, "Hedgehog's not on your menu tonight"

Meanwhile, Nanoha and Fate were trading blows and spells in their own battle. It didn't take long for either of them to start taking things up a notch.

"_**Thunder Smasher"**_ Bardiche declared as Fate unleashed a powerful torrent of magic in her bombardment spell that looked much similar to Nanoha's Divine Buster, albeit with a more yellowish color to the mana.

"_**Divine Buster"**_ Raising Heart chimed as Nanoha countered with her own bombardment spell. Hers and Fate's collided in a huge explosion-like clash that seemed to signify the evened out powers put behind the spells.

"Raising Heart, onegai!" Nanoha called out to her device, almost praying that she could pour more power in. Her effort did not go to waste as her bombardment spell's power jumped up quite considerably, and it was well enough for the Buster to overpower Fate's smasher.

When the dust settled from all of that, Fate was nowhere to be seen. While it wouldn't be too unreasonable to assume that she got caught up in the blast, a betting person wouldn't put money on that.

"She's strong…very strong" Arf commented as she and Sonic had halted their fight again at a stalemate to watch the power struggle between their mistresses; the wolf levelled a serious look at her counterpart, "But she, like you, blue boy, is still too innocent."

"Come again?" Sonic blinked and looked up at the sky, only to gape and pale at what he saw, "Oh…NANOHA! HEADS UP!"

"_**Scythe Slash"**_ If Sonic's loud shout wasn't any indication alone to Nanoha that something was up, Bardiche's mechanical voice from about five feet away certainly was. When she looked, Nanoha found herself on the wrong end of her rival's surprise melee attack from above. There was nothing she could do about it. Aside from float in place in no man's land, she closed her eyes and flinched away from a potential life ending strike

* * *

><p><strong>[Battle End]<br>[No BGM]**

That strike never came; Fate stopped her attack just as the tip of her scythe reached Nanoha's neck. Much to Nanoha's obvious surprise and shock, she felt no contact between the Scythe mode Bardiche and her neck, although she could faintly feel the heat of her counterpart's magic tickle her skin slightly. Through the one eye that she didn't have closed, Nanoha could get a close look at Fate's face; the neutral, almost emotionless expression on her face as she could feel the girl gaze stare at her.

"_**Pull out"**_ Raising Heart chimed out as it released one random Jewel Seed from its storage. One Jewel Seed, as if to honor the terms of the bet that Fate had previously laid down.

"Raising Heart?!" Nanoha was shocked at this and tried to question with her device, "What are you doing?!"

"It's worried about you and it did this to protect you" Fate said as she removed Bardiche from being positioned at her counterpart's neck and allowed the Jewel Seed to fall into her grasp before allowing herself to float down to the ground. Once she did so, she called out to her familiar, "Arf, we're going home"

"I expected nothing less from my dear, lovely master!" Definitely not one to disregard an order from her lovely master, Arf shapeshifted back to her humanoid form, "Cute little girl, blue boy, ja ne~!"

"Matte!" Nanoha called out to the blonde as soon as she herself touched down, trying to give chase with Sonic and Yuuno in tow, but with little intentions of getting in another fight.

"If either of you can help it, never appear before us again." Fate, with her back turned, still stopped to talk to her counterpart, if only for that stern warning, "I may not be able to stop myself next time."

"Your name.." Nanoha called to her again, "What's your name?"

"Fate.." the girl answered softly, "Fate Testarossa.."

"Um.. I'm.." Before Nanoha could finish her statement, Fate had already taken flight and left the area.

Arf was soon to follow her, but before she did so, she sent a cute, teasing wink in the direction of the trio of rivals, "Bye bye~!"

For the second time, Nanoha and Sonic had to swallow another bad result from a confrontation with Fate and Arf. This time they lost a Jewel Seed of their own; though at least they knew the names of who they were dealing with.

The trek back to the Uminari City Hot Springs complex was a long and quiet one. When they got back, to little surprise, they found that Nanoha's parents had waited up for them. There wasn't much said, as Nanoha was not only too tired, she wasn't also in the talking mood. With a promise made to recap their night battle in the morning, Nanoha, Sonic and Yuuno went to the room they had shared with Alisa and Suzuka. The mentioned girls had also waited up for their friends, as it didn't take long for them to notice their absence as evidenced in the empty futons. They said nothing however and let the three go to bed peacefully. Though Nanoha, Sonic and Yuuno were able to finally get to sleep; they wouldn't be able to get much rest at all.

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 7]<strong>

Author's notes: Well to add to that consolation. All of that happened on the first day; so the days for their stay at the spa would do some good to help them put that behind them. Anyways, the spa scene would've been my favorite if not for the Nanoha/Sonic vs Fate/Arf battle. We don't really know Fate's motifs for all of this and before we start thinking of her as your prototypical enemy, she isn't. Neither she nor Arf are really "evil" in a sense, they're just on opposite sides and after the same thing. Anyways! Reviews please! Constructive criticism please! Comments please! I'd love for some opinions


	8. Chapter 8

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter of Lyrical Familiar. With last chapter's battle between Nanoha and Fate plus their respective familiars, how do I top that? Wait and see, here goes.

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City]<br>[Takamachi Residence]  
>[Local time: 0630]<br>[BGM: "kizuna, shinjite" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Although it was like the start of any other school day for Nanoha Takamachi; waking up and washing up in the bathroom before getting ready to start her day, the young girl had a lot on her mind. Sonic was right outside the door, waiting for Nanoha to finish, but he, like his mage, had plenty to think about over the past few days as well.

"_Sonic-kun?" _Nanoha called out to her blue familiar as she washed her face in the cool water from the sink, _"I've been thinking a lot about her lately."_

"_I could tell" _the blue hedgehog let out a small sigh, his thoughtful tone was evident in his response_, "Getting beat twice in that many run-ins will do that to you."_

"_Fate-chan had such deep beautiful eyes"_ the brunette reflected, remembering her encounters with Fate Testarossa, _"She looked like she could've been the same age as us."_

"_There's something off about her; her and that wolf-lady familiar of hers"_ Sonic noted, shaking his head as he tried to come up with something to describe what he meant, only to fail in finding the words,_ "I can't explain it"_

"_Her eyes; they seemed so lonely." _Nanoha replied back in their little back-and-forth exchange, _"Sad and lonely.."_

"_You know we'll probably just clash with them again"_ the hedgehog noted, easily allowing his feelings to influence the tone of his transmission so Nanoha was able to note that he didn't like saying that, _"If we see them again, we'll have to fight."_

"_I know that" _Nanoha toweled off her face and stared at her reflection in the mirror, _"But, there has to be a way for us to understand their feelings, and for them to understand ours."_

Sonic fell silent on the other end; he had absolutely nothing that he could say to help her out on that matter. The rest of the morning was spent in silence and deep thoughts.

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 8<br>Feelings that can't be understood?!**

* * *

><p><strong>[Seishou Elementary School]<br>[No BGM]**

Sonic was busying himself redoubling his work ethic in his training with Yuuno and Miyuki, and he has done such since the first encounter with Fate. Something that has drawn concern among the two; and although they knew why, it frustrated them that, with the exception of Yuuno, they couldn't do a darn thing to help out. That same frustration was also present in Nanoha's best friends and classmates in school, Alisa and Suzuka. Only today, the frustration had hit the tipping point for Alisa Bannings.

"Give me a break already!" the dirty-blonde heiress slammed her hand on Nanoha's desk in that frustration, her raised voice drew concerned glances among the other classmates, "You've been zoning off into space since the first day at the hot springs, no matter what we're talking about"

"G-gomen ne, Alisa-chan" Nanoha apologized, weakly lowering her head to stare at said desk.

"Don't apologize! It doesn't matter if we already know why" Alisa continued on, letting her frustrated feelings loose. Thankfully, she had the right mind to stop herself right there and turn around before things really got ugly, "I need to take a walk. Let's go Suzuka-chan!"

"Alisa-chan.." Suzuka tried to call out to said dirty-blonde girl as she retreated quickly out of the room.

"It's fine Suzuka-chan.." Nanoha offered a weak smile to her purple-haired best friend, "It was my fault."

"I don't know about that.. but Alisa-chan went overboard.." Suzuka, despite knowing and understand full well why Alisa was upset and she would've been lying to herself if said feelings didn't affect her, but she was willing to give her friend the benefit of the doubt and act as the voice of reason, "I'm going to go have a talk with her."

"Gomen ne.." was really all Nanoha could say, but had to concede that her effort was on the futile side as she could only watch as Suzuka ran out after Alisa, "I made Alisa-chan angry.."

Out in the hallway outside of the classroom and near the staircase that went down to a lower floor of the school building, Suzuka made haste to find Alisa and try to talk to her. She finally caught up to the girl as she was walking down a flight of stairs.

"Alisa-chan!" Suzuka finally got in range of even being able to even talk to her; she called to the girl as she rested her arms over the thick railway that would allow those who were walking on the right side of the stairs to hold on to.

"What?" Alisa stopped mid-step and turned to face the purple-haired girl and made eye contact.

"I can understand why you're angry at Nanoha-chan" Suzuka spoke, "But you can't get angry over things like this."

"That's what annoys me so much!" Alisa huffed out, "Ever since that first day at the hot springs she's looked lost and troubled and we both know why. But there isn't a damn thing we can do to help her."

"I know how you feel and it bothers me too." Suzuka nodded slightly in agreement, sharing that feeling of helplessness, "You really like Nanoha-chan, don't you?"

"Of course I do!" Alisa admitted truthfully

* * *

><p><strong>[Rooftop of the school]<br>[BGM: "Kono hiroi sekai ni" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

The two made their way up to the rooftop level of the school building, where Alisa let her fingers grip softly against the chain-link fence that was more-or-less set up for safety purposes. Both she and Suzuka stared out at the cityscape view.

"Because she was there for me, I was no longer alone.." Alisa softly admitted as she looked ahead.

"Yeah.. it was the same for me" Suzuka shared that feeling

The two of them shared a flashback to how they first actually became friends. Alisa was a bit of a troublemaker and a bully while Suzuka and Nanoha were friends. When Alisa was a bully she had once targeted Suzuka and messed with her. Nanoha took exception, slapping the dirty-blonde hard on the cheek, leaving a small mark for Alisa to favor.

"Because she was there" Suzuka said in reflection, "The two of us were able to become friends."

* * *

><p><strong>[Classroom]<br>[No BGM]**

The school bell rang to end the day and Nanoha stowed a textbook inside her bag, as she was about to stand and leave the classroom, Susuka called to her.

"Nanoha-chan, gomen ne" the purple haired girl apologized, though Alisa was still unwilling to look at their friend, "We both have music lessons today, so.."

"You'll be gone till later tonight, right?" Nanoha finished for her, knowing them, "Hope you have a nice time and do your best."

Alisa, still with her back turned, said nothing and walked on ahead. There was nothing either of the two could do but watch her leave. Nanoha had felt personally responsible for Alisa's frustrated feelings and wasn't so sure if there was anything she could do to make matters better.

"Alisa-chan.." Suzuka softly trailed off before quickly turning to face Nanoha again, "Don't worry, Nanoha-chan. I'm sure everything will turn our all right, so do your best too"

"Ah.. thank you Suzuka-chan" Nanoha smiled softly back

* * *

><p><strong>[En route away from the school]<br>[No BGM]**

It was a rare occurrence, but Nanoha was walking home from school all alone. That much wasn't her fault though, both girls had things to do so she couldn't help that, but she was still troubled. If her encounters with Fate weren't on her mind, she had to also deal with the feelings of Alisa and Suzuka. She knew why they were upset, even if Suzuka was willing to help her out, but she was troubled, and there wasn't anything her two best friends could do to help.

'_Now that I think about it... It's been awhile since I walked home alone'_ Nanoha thought to herself as she rounded a turn, pausing at a sign, _'I think I better stop somewhere; I don't want anyone to see my face right now.'_

**[POV: Alisa and Suzuka]**

The two girls sat in the rear seat of the limo. Both of them stared out the windows with thoughtful expressions, blankly watching the cityscape pass by.

"When we all first met.." Suzuka reflected, "I was weak… Weaker than I am now and I couldn't say what I was thinking. No matter what anyone said or did to me, I could never stand up to them"

"And I was a terrible kid who thought only of herself…" Alisa added to that, "I was selfish and a bully. I always made fun of our classmates and joked about everything, because my heart was weak."

There was a brief flashback of the two girls, both a little bit younger, probably in kindergarten. Alisa had bullied Suzuka and had taken the purple-head's favorite headband away, keeping it out of arms reach.

"Because I was weak back then, I couldn't say what I wanted to say…" Suzuka stared at her skirt, "That it was really precious to me and for you to give it back to me."

"Even after you told me to stop, I didn't listen.." Alisa mirrored that motion staring down at her feet in regret and reflection, "because I thought that if I listened to what someone else had to say I'd lose for some reason."

Little did they know; Nanoha had also paused in her walk home and sat at a nearby bench to reflect on the same memory, contacting her familiar in the process to let him know what had happened and explain her relationship with the two. Their shared recollection brief reflection to that memory reached to Nanoha's intervention. The brunette probably came out of nowhere because Alisa didn't see her coming and by the time she did, the damage was done. The young Nanoha had slapped her hard; the stinging pain and red mark on the left side of her face, near the cheek and under her eye.

"What was it Nanoha-chan said back then?" Suzuka asked, thinking back to that day, it had seemed so long ago.

**[BGM: "Namae wo yonde" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

" "Does that hurt?" " Alisa quoted word-for-word what Nanoha had said back then, " "The hearts of people who have their precious things taken away hurt a lot more!" "

"That's right" Suzuka recalled in agreement

**[POV: Nanoha]**

"_After that, I got into a big fight with Alisa-chan.." _Nanoha had summed up the story for Sonic to hear over the mind-speak, feeling a bit comfortable letting him in the know on that. She continued the story accurately, retelling how her younger self fought with Alisa. Neither of them giving in to one another; deadlocked in their struggle.

"_Who broke up the fight?"_ Sonic asked, silently absorbing all of the reflection, all he could do was listen to her story.

**[POV: Alisa and Suzuka]**

Granted the two girls in the limo had no idea that Nanoha was talking to Sonic about their shared story. Arguably even if they did, they wouldn't mind it so much as they have come to accept Sonic as a friend quite easily.

"The incredibly quiet girl who decided to be brave.." Alisa reflected more, remembering when the young Suzuka shouted "STOP IT!" as loud as she could. Her sudden scream having put a complete stop to their fight, Nanoha and Suzuka just stared at her.

"Back then… that was because I was so desperate." Suzuka frowned a bit, her eyes building up the moisture, but not quite enough for tears.

"After that, we started talking more and more to each other, right?" Alisa, her gaze fixated out the window but at nothing in particular, asked.

"Yeah…" Suzuka nodded, "Just the three of us."

"So?" Alisa turned her gaze from the window to her feet, "What did you want from me, bringing up that old story?"

"You should know the answer to that" Suzuka gazed in her best friend's direction; causing Alisa to do the same and lock gazes together. Alisa looked at her for a second before she looked away and at her feet again.

"I understand that we'd probably only get in their way if we tried to help, but if all we can do is wait… then I'm going to just be angry while waiting!" Alisa said, with a frown, letting all of her frustrations vent out, "Angry at her sadness and pain; angry that she has to go through all of this, and we, even as her best friends, can't do anything to help her out."

"You sure are stubborn" Suzuka giggled lightly

"Hmph!" Alisa said no more,

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence]<br>[Local time range: 1630-1700 hours]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The late-afternoon sun had slowly started to set, painting the sky a bright yellowish-orange hue. It was around that time that Nanoha had returned home as she had finished that story in mind-speak to Sonic. She sat at her desk with her head resting on the table. She talked to Yuuno about the incident she had with Alisa while Sonic, who had already heard the whole story, lazily laid on top of the brunette's bed.

"I see.." Yuuno nodded in some understanding, "So you got into a fight.."

"That's not it" Nanoha declined that part, "Alisa-chan got frustrated because I kept zoning out."

"She's your best friend, right?" The ferret asked

"Yeah" the girl confirmed, "Almost since I started school."

The ferret hung his head, one of the few times where he'd say that informing civilians of what they do isn't the best idea in the world. Nanoha, feeling the need to cheer the Tutorial Ferret off, offered him a headpiece half of Taiyaki that she bought on the way home.

"Here, this is your share" she held it out and turned to face Sonic so she could offer him a large piece as well, "This is your share, Sonic-kun. Don't eat it on the bed please; the stains and crumbs are tough to clean up"

"Why would I anyway? I'm sleeping on it too" the hedgehog stood up and moved to a chair with a shrug. Not one familiar to the Japanese recreational snacks, Sonic unintentionally made a bit of a humorous display as he looked at the fish-shaped snack before taking a bite. He munched quietly for a bit before he could say anything about how it tasted, "Hey this is pretty good."

"Glad you like it" Nanoha's cheerfulness returned in full form as she smiled at the blue hedgehog. She then turned to face Yuuno, "I don't have cram school today, so we should be able to hunt for some Jewel Seeds until dinnertime. So let's do our best"

"Yeah.. let's" Yuuno nodded in agreement.

* * *

><p><strong>[Apartment of Fate Testarossa]<br>[No BGM]**

It was around the same time at the shared apartment of Fate and Arf that the latter wolf-woman familiar lounged herself lazily on the couch and indulged herself in some of Earth's delicacies. As much of a delicacy canned dog food can be; but she was part wolf so the canine taste buds influenced that matter. Fate was nowhere to be seen.

"The food they have here.." Arf, opting to eat out of a recently opened can of dog food with chopsticks, said in complimentary and enjoying fashion as her tail waved in approval, "Isn't all that bad!"

"Now then, let's check on how my little hime-sama is doing." the wolf-woman said as she stood up and half-heartedly left the emptied can of dog food on the already dirtied table. Arf really liked her dog food; she had multiple boxes and cans of the stuff all over the table. There was one box of dog treats that she noticed went untaken, "Oops, almost forgot about this."

Fate silently lay on her bed, facing the wall so her back would've been to Arf as she walked in. On the desk next to her bed was a full tray of a modest meal. Porridge that didn't look like it was touched at all, some pastries that might've been bitten into, but it was hard to tell, and a teapot with an empty mug, probably untouched as well. It was something that Arf had noticed, and it probably wasn't the first time she caught her mistress neglecting a meal.

"Haa.. you haven't touched your meal again" the wolf-woman said as she passed by and sat next to her mistress, softly patting the top of her head in the process, "That's no good, you have to eat."

"I had some of it.." Fate said, still staring at the wall, "I'm fine, so don't worry."

As the yellowish-blonde haired girl sat up on her bed, Arf was greeted with a disturbingly familiar sight that she hated to see. Fresh marks and cuts on Fate's back that looked like the product of a recent lashing with a whip. The marks didn't look pleasant and it was only the cloak that Fate wore all the time that prevented anyone from seeing those painful whip marks. Fate would never say anything about them though and her sudden question drew Arf's attention off the cuts and to her.

"Shall we get going, then?" Fate asked softly, "I've been able to determine where the next Jewel Seed should be. And I don't want to keep Kaa-san waiting for too long."

"Well.. because you're my master, Fate…" Now it was Arf who turned her back, unwilling to glance at Fate so long as she could see the whip marks on her back, "And because I'm your familiar… if you ask me to go, I'll go, but…"

"Oh, we can go after you finish eating, if you want." Fate offered, the open box of dog treats had caught her eye.

"Ah!" Arf turned to look at that green box with the smiling puppy on the front cover, busted! She quickly pushed it away and shook her head, "T-that's not what I meant. I'm worried about you, Fate. Using wide area searching magic uses a lot of your physical strength… yet you're hardly eating anything, and barely resting…and your wound isn't something you can take lightly either."

"I'm fine, because I'm strong." Fate closed her eyes, kindly appreciative of her familiar's concern. She clapped her hands, making her gloves appear to cover them, stood up and produced her cloak from probably a magic pocket dimension of sorts.

"Fate.." Arf could only watch.

"Now then, let's go" Fate quickly cast her cloak over her back, concealing all of the marks that were on her back, "Kaa-san's waiting for me."

* * *

><p><strong>[Midori-ya Café]<br>[No BGM]**

While Nanoha and Sonic were out and about on their Jewel Seed hunt with Yuuno, the café was quite busy with the high school girls filling up the place. Shirou and Momoko calmly went about their business in running the café from the registers. The absence of their youngest daughter and her familiar wasn't hard to miss, but they both had trust in her ability to take care of herself and Sonic's own promise to keep her safe as well. The two also had Yuuno with them, and he had the most magic experience.

Meanwhile in the kitchen area of the café, Kyouya and Shinobu were washing the dishes. The latter girl had a bit on her mind and it had to do with the missing brunette. Even though there were no secrets with Nanoha, the recent events that had her down had worried Shinobu's younger sibling and her as well.

"Ne, Kyouya… about Nanoha-chan.." Shinobu asked her boyfriend, "Do you think that this magic job she's been is starting to become too much for her? She looked down the last time I saw her and Suzuka-chan's been worried about her too…"

"Yeah," Kyouya agreed, "She's been that way since our vacation to the hot springs.."

"I might be prying a bit too much, but I think what happened there may have hurt her confidence." The girl noted, offering a solution, "Do you think you could ask her to talk to me about it?"

"Thanks for the offer, but I don't think she'll talk about it" Kyouya politely declined, though he was happy that his girlfriend was concerned.

"So I'm no good?" Shinobu paused and turned to face her boyfriend.

"Ah, that's not it! That is definitely not it." Kyouya calmly reassured her, "She probably won't talk to you specifically. We all know what she's doing out there, but I think that since she feels that since we aren't involved, we aren't the ones she should talk about this to. She'll only talk to Yuuno or Sonic."

"Speaking of Sonic-kun" Shinobu said, mentioning the hedgehog, "How long do you think he'll be living here?"

"I don't think he plans on leaving anytime soon. He's grown accustomed to living here; even if he doesn't say much about it." Kyouya answered, "Miyuki said that she appreciates his work ethic and how well of a pupil he's been in learning our style."

"He's done a good job at the café as well" Shinobu noted in observation, "It took him a little adjusting but he took my advice and he's done well when he's working at the café."

"Well then… I'm sure we can trust them to work it out" Kyouya encouraged with some optimism, "There isn't anything we can do directly, but we can at least be her to support them; tell Suzuka-chan that and that should help."

"I see.." Shinobu nodded and returned to her dish duties, "I'll tell her"

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City: Downtown]<br>[Local Time: 1905 hours (appx 7:05 pm)]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Their search had gone for a little over two and a half hours, but Sonic, Nanoha and Yuuno have come up empty so far. It was only a glance at a nearby video screen ad on a building that clued the trio in to how late it was and how little time they had before they were expected to return for dinner. After all that's happened in the day, the last thing Nanoha wanted was to worry more people.

"Ah.. we may be out of time." Nanoha said, taking notice of the time on that ad, "Sonic-kun and I need to get home soon."

"Don't worry about it" Yuuno said from his spot on her shoulder, "I'll stay around here and search for a little bit longer."

"You sure about that?" Sonic asked, "Think you'll be alright by yourself?"

"Yeah" Yuuno might've glared at the hedgehog if not for the slight tone of concern Sonic had, "You two can go home and have dinner with your family, alright?"

"Okay" Nanoha nodded and started to run off with Sonic jogging along with her to keep pace, albeit he could've easily overtaken her, he just chose not to. As Nanoha ran, a thought occurred to her considering the time, _'Alisa-chan and Suzuka-chan should probably be on their way home by now.'_

Nanoha stopped her trek just before it reached a window display stand for a clothes shop. Sonic, sensing her halt, also stopped. He was about to ask when he saw the girl pull out her cell phone to check her e-mail. Much to Nanoha's dismay, she saw that she had received no new email messages.

"Anything?" Sonic asked, though he had a sinking feeling that he shouldn't get his hopes up.

"Nothing" the girl shook her head, closed her phone and pocketed it.

"Don't worry, they'll come around" Sonic attempted to assure his mage, "Let's head home"

Nanoha nodded and continued her trek again with the hedgehog in tow. Her ears did not miss him referring to her house as home, but she didn't pay it much mind, figuring that was just part of getting used to living with her family.

Meanwhile in a different part not too far away from where Nanoha and Sonic were running, Fate and her familiar Arf, who was in wolf form, landed on the top of a skyscraper. They gazed out at the city, searching for the Jewel Seed that Fate had determined was around the area.

"I'm pretty sure it's around here somewhere" Fate noted as she looked from building to building, "But I can only get a rough reading"

"Yeah, I can understand." Arf sighed, "Searching through a big city like this is a serious pain."

"This may be a bit heavy-handed" Fate said as she held up Bardiche, her device, "But I'll release a lot of magic power across this area and force its activation."

"Ah wait wait!" Arf quickly argued, "I'll do that for you."

"Will you be alright?" Fate asked in concern, "You'll be drained afterwards…"

"Just whose familiar do you think I am?" Arf would've sounded hurt; albeit the only thing that might have hurt would've been her pride.

"I'm counting on you then" Fate held Bardiche at her side.

"Well then…" Arf spread her arms and legs out in a preparation stance as if she was about to take a huge leap, only she stayed in place and focused hard. At her feet appeared a large magic circle similar to her masters only a slightly different color. From her position a large pillar of magic emitted and shot straight up into the air.

* * *

><p><strong>[BGM: "Ketsudan no Toki" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

The outburst of power quickly got the attention of Sonic, Nanoha and Yuuno and, from their respective different positions in the city, they watched as a gathering of dark clouds quickly start to cover the sky over the city. The clouds descended over the city and, while there was no rain, lightning struck down all over the place. While it didn't look like the lightning was anywhere close to any civilian in the city, Yuuno did not want to take any chances of that.

"A forced activation spell?! Here?!" the ferret looked up at the sky and took on a serious expression and took off in a different direction, "This is dangerous! Hope I can make it in time."

"Sonic-kun.." Nanoha took one look up at the sky and back to her familiar. She quickly threw up her device and called forth its staff form and her Barrier Jacket, "The weather didn't call for thunderstorms."

"Guess dinner will have to wait then" Sonic shook his head and quickly shifted to his own Barrier Jacket and twin blades, "Let's go."

Meanwhile with Fate and Arf, the two watched as their activation spell went to work on the city, hoping it would bring up any sign of a Jewel Seed. Their efforts were soon rewarded as through that magic lightning, a bright, light-bluish flash of energy shot directly up into the air.

"Found it!" Fate saw it immediately.

"Fate.." Arf noted in caution, "It looks like _they_ are here as well."

"Let's finish this quickly then" the girl nodded and held up her device, "Bardiche"

"_**Glaive form, set up!"**_ The device declared in its mechanical male voice and its display showed the appropriate text, shifted into said Glaive form.

With Yuuno, he came to a point where he was close enough and began to focus his mana and energy into creating a wide-area barrier that would keep civilians, unless they were sensitive to the magic, from going inside and getting hurt. During that time, he saw fit to contact Nanoha and Sonic.

"_Nanoha, Sonic" _The ferret called to them via the mind-speak, _"Can you see that activated Jewel Seed?"_

"_Yeah." _Nanoha sent back, _"I think"_

"_It's hard to miss a large pillar of light in the middle of a city"_ Sonic noted in slight sarcasm, _"I think we're close to it."_

"_That other girl is pretty close to it too" _Yuuno noted in warning, _"Seal it before she does!"_

"_Got it!"_ Nanoha nodded as her device shifted to its cannon form. At the same time that happened Nanoha also noticed a yellow stream of energy shoot out from Fate's location aimed at the location of the Jewel Seed. With a gasp, she quickly countered and shot one of her own at the Seed. Both beams clashed and collided with the seed. As their spells collided, they made the seed levitate some ways and it's Serial Number, XIV, was revealed.

"Lyrical Magical!" Nanoha shouted out her magic incantation, hoping to seal it before Fate could.

"Jewel Seed Serial XIV" Fate called out as she prepared to seal it.

"Seal!" Both girls called out at the same time and within no time blasts were fired. They both collided with each other at the same time with the Seed still in the middle. The sealing spells reacted with the seed before dispelling. The Jewel Seed was left floating in the middle of the area inside a bluish sphere.

**[BGM: "Daijoubu da yo" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Nanoha, who was the closest to the Seed when she fired her shot, slowly walked to it. The memory of how she, Alisa and Suzuka became friends resurfaced as she walked. Back when Alisa was a bully with a weak heart, while Suzuka was too weak to stand up for herself. Nanoha remembered slapping Alisa hard and the fight the two got into after with Suzuka screaming as loud as she could for them to stop.

'_When I first met both Alisa-chan and Suzuka chan, we weren't friends..' _Nanoha reflected in her thoughts as she stared up at the Jewel Seed, _'Because we couldn't talk with each another. Because we couldn't understand each other. Alisa-chan got mad at me today because I kept feeling sad, and even though she and Suzuka-chan understood why, there was nothing they could do to help.'_

"Yatta!" Yuuno said as he soon came up to Nanoha upon noticing that the Jewel Seed was ready to be captured, "Nanoha, hurry up and seal it!"

"Like we'll let her!" Arf's voice shouted from above the trio as the said wolf-familiar fell towards them, intending on letting gravity be her power and slam into the white-clad mage while she wasn't looking. Unfortunately the wolf was intercepted by a quick guard barrier by Sonic. The blue hedgehog didn't let her do that the first time so he had no reason for letting her try and succeed again. Nanoha flinched as she heard the wolf crash land into Sonic's barrier. The blue hedgehog let his own barrier crack apart so he could head-first tackle Arf to the ground and also letting Nanoha stare at Fate, who landed on top of a nearby light post opposite her.

'_Because we both have the same goal… there might be no way we can avoid fighting like this… But I want to know!'_ Nanoha thought as she took a determined step towards the girl on the post, "Last time, we couldn't properly introduce ourselves… I'm Nanoha! Takamachi Nanoha! I'm a third grade student at Seishou Elementary School."

"_**Scythe Form"**_ Bardiche declared while Fate kept silent, forcing Nanoha to take a defensive stance

'_Why does she have such lonely eyes..?' _Nanoha questioned as she stared at Fate, noticing that lonely feeling in the latter girl's eyes. She watched as Fate took the scythe-form device and rushed her. Raising Heart declared and automatically cast the Flier Fin spell to allow Nanoha to dodge while Sonic busied himself with taking care of Arf.

* * *

><p><strong>[Elsewhere]<strong>

Outside of the barrier in the middle of the city, Alisa and Suzuka just finished up their lessons and were about to head home. Suzuka, wanting to give Nanoha the heads up, typed up an email message to send.

"Sending a message to Nanoha?" Alisa asked the girl

"Yeah, and I got a message from onee-chan." Suzuka replied, "She talked to Kyouya-san about Nanoha-chan and he told her that even though we can't do anything to help her out. We can cheer her on and give her moral support."

"He did, huh.." Alisa pondered that thought for a moment, adopting a cute thoughtful expression as she felt that it might've been a good idea. Quickly though, noticing Suzuka's giggle, she huffed and turned around, "Hmph!"

"Stubborn Alisa-chan" Suzuka giggled and sent the email message to Nanoha about their update, also adding that they're cheering for her all the way.

* * *

><p><strong>[Downtown Uminari City]<br>[Fate/Arf vs Nanoha/Sonic]  
>[BGM: "Yuzurenai Omoi" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

As Nanoha and Fate clashed with one another in streams of pink and yellow respectively, Sonic and Arf clashed with each other in a different area though one within sight of their quarreling masters. Both mages and familiars that clashed had an equal matchup as neither side gave in to the other. Arf felt a little bit frustrated at how despite being warned, Nanoha and Sonic still tried to get in their way.

"Why? Why don't you just stay out of our way?!" Arf shouted in frustrated to her blue counterpart as her clawed paws clashed with his blades, "Didn't you guys get the message the first time?"

"Getting in someone's way is just what I do best, Moreover.." Sonic trailed off and took a slight sniff, almost gagging a bit as he pushed the wolf back, "What in the world did you EAT? Dog food?! Your breath stinks of it!"

"Why you little… " Arf, feeling just a tad angered by the hedgehog's insult, roared and fired off a volley of Photon Lancer Multishot bullets; all of them shot at close range, making it almost impossible to avoid them all if her target tried. Sonic, utilizing his speed and experience as it was definitely not the first time someone has tried to shoot at him close range, avoided a majority of the rounds before using a defensive Protection barrier spell to neutralize the rest.

"Yeah, I get that you're a wolf or something in that family, but you have a human form. Try having a gourmet meal every once in a while.. Dog food... meh.." Sonic rushed in and used his swords to attack. While the majority of his blows were blocked, he managed to make contact on grazing blows. And as he fought her, the blue hedgehog couldn't help but notice that something was a bit off with Arf and on their next stalemate pause, he held up to ask her about it "Are you okay? You seem a little bit drained or something"

"I used up a little bit more strength than I wanted to in that forced activation spell" The wolf admitted though she shook her head in an attempt to refocus and not let her fatigue get the better of her, "But don't worry, I've still got enough to deal with a newbie like you"

"Bring it…" Sonic smirked and went right back into combat again.

Meanwhile, Nanoha and Fate were deadlocked in another evenly matched duel. Neither of them could seem to get the advantage. Whenever Fate managed to use her speed to get behind Nanoha, the latter girl would use her Flash Move spell to do the same. Nanoha, playing to her strength, utilized a volley of her Divine Shooter spell rounds to attack but they were well defended against with Fate's Defenser.

The Jewel Seed, almost as if teasing either of them to try and take it, flickered as it floated in place. The two halted a small distance away from each other and had their devices pointed straight ahead.

"Fate-chan!" Nanoha suddenly called out, commanding the other girl's attention with her voice.

The sudden call stopped Fate from doing anything else for the time being. It was only when she was sure that Fate's gaze was locked on her and that she was able to hear, that Nanoha would try and reason with her with words.

"You said nothing would change just by talking…" The girl began, "But I'm sure there are things we can't communicate to each other without using words! We might not be able to do anything about competing with each other like this… but I can't stand fighting like this without knowing anything about you!"

Sonic and Arf continued to clash with one another. In no time they were deadlocked again, oblivious to the stalemate in between their respective mages.

"Originally I was gathering the Jewel Seeds because Yuuno-kun was searching for them… because Yuuno-kun needs to gather and return them to where they belong." Nanoha continued on, "But now I'm gathering the Jewel Seeds on my own free will! I don't want to put the people around me or my city in danger! That's… my reason for doing this!"

"…" Fate fell silent, quietly absorbing the girl's words. Deep down she could feel the latter girl's honest feelings in what she said and was unsure about if she should say anything, "I.."

"Fate!" Arf shouted out, dragging Fate from her thoughts. She, and Sonic who had stopped fighting when there was a clear stalemate in all of the action were on a rooftop almost underneath the two, "You don't have to tell anything to people who are just acting nice to you in a strange neighborhood… and are probably just trying to use you anyway!"

"Oh come on! Acting?! Really?! She's being completely honest with her! I know that because I feel the same way!" Sonic cut off Arf from whatever she was going to say next. In no way was he going to let this go by without getting a chance to have his words heard, "Coming here; I didn't have too many friends and no family, and my home was almost destroyed a month ago. It was by complete coincidence that I met her and yet she saved my life out of the goodness of her own heart. Now I have those close to me who I can call friends and family. Listen to her!"

What Sonic said may have confused Fate further, but Arf was more stubborn than that. She turned and growled viciously and protectively to the hedgehog before she went on.

"That doesn't matter right now!" The wolf shouted, "Our main priority is the Jewel Seeds!"

**[No BGM]**

The aforementioned Jewel Seed was still there, right below the two mages. Flickering multiple times as if taunting either of them to try and take it. Fate immediately descended downward, hoping to snare it in her Device's grasp before Nanoha could. Nanoha had other ideas on that matter and followed suit.

For that moment it seemed as if time stopped. Arf, Sonic and Yuuno all watched in shock as Nanoha and Fate had locked devices with one another. Only this time the Jewel Seed was right in the middle of the two. No one had any idea what was to happen next. Only the sudden cracks, both visible and audible on Raising Heart and Bardiche could've been heard or seen before it all happened.

The energy built up between the two mages and the Jewel Seed suddenly erupted in a huge, massive explosion of light and energy that engulfed both mages. Nanoha, unable to do anything, closed her eyes screamed out loud as the light caught her while Fate could only shield her eyes and grunt as she was also caught up in it.

* * *

><p><strong>[Elsewhere]<br>[Time: appx 1945 hours]**

Just as they were about to get in the limo and head for home, Alisa and Suzuka both stopped and turned to look in another direction, particularly downtown. Neither of the two knew why, but they almost could feel that something bad has happened and their friend Nanoha was right in the middle of it again. Oddly enough, as quick as that feeling came, it soon left them.

"Alisa-chan.." Suzuka asked the dirty-blondehead, who had just about entered the rear seat of the limo, "Did you feel that just now?"

"Yeah, I don't know what it is, but something happened" Alisa nodded, shaking her head as if trying to figure out what she felt, "Check your phone, maybe Nanoha sent something."

"Hai." Suzuka nodded and flipped open her phone to check for any messages. Unfortunately, she got the same display as before; she had not received any messages from Nanoha. She stared at that screen for a few moments, "Nothing.."

"There's nothing we can do right now anyways, we'll just ask her tomorrow" Alisa, although she would've been lying if she said she wasn't concerned and hated that helpless feeling, sighed with her hand on her hip, "Come on, let's go home, I'm starving."

"Hai" Suzuka took one last glance in that same direction before joining Alisa in the back of the limo. The butler who had held the door open for the two heiresses shut the door and the limo drove away.

**[To Be Continued!]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]<strong>

**[End of Chapter 8]**

Author's Notes: Uh oh.. oh boy.. what happened here? What happened with Nanoha and Fate? The Jewel Seed just… something.. what happened?! CLIFFHANGER! Ain't I a stinka? Anyways, opinions please! Let me know what you think of this chapter. I didn't want the story to be completely one-sided from Sonic's POV. I was going for full coverage including how everyone else was dealing with the whole magic schtick. And how I formatted some of the dialogues here.. And there's still plenty of things to note here.. Fate's wounds, what could've caused them?


	9. Chapter 9

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter to Lyrical Familiar. Apologies for the long wait, I've been in SoCal for the past week or so, and I have been a bit too busy to get things going with fishing and seeing the 2nd game of the Freeway Series between the Dodgers and Angels at Dodger stadium. It was loud but otherwise fun; saw the Dodgers win on a walk-off E-5 (3rd baseman) which I felt should've been E-2 (catcher) because the throw should've been caught. At any rate, this opening note is not for Baseball talk; let's get on with the story. I don't own Sonic the Hedgehog or characters of his franchise, and I don't own characters from the Lyrical Nanoha series either. They belong to Sonic Team and Seven Arcs respectively. Granted that note was probably obvious, but legal peoples make me put the note out there anyways. Let's go.

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Urban District – Inside a barrier]  
>[Local DateTime: April 26****th****, PM 20:27 (appx 8:27 pm)]  
>[BGM: "Ketsudan no Toki" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

The Jewel Seed, with its serial number shown with the Roman Numerals "XIV" in red text, floated in the middle of Nanoha and Fate. It glimmered brightly, as if almost to tease the girls into capturing it. The girls rushed for it, only to meet up at the same time and clash their devices together; with said Jewel Seed in the middle. Their respective familiars, Sonic and Arf, along with the ferret archeologist mage, Yuuno Scrya, stopped and stared at the clash. None of the trio had any clue as to what could've happened, but they all had the sudden sense of foreboding.

Sure enough, the chain reaction from both magical girls' devices clashing, adding to the own power of the Jewel Seed, mixed for a very dangerous eruption. An explosive burst that had both girls caught right up in the middle of it.

The girls screamed out loud as they were engulfed. Although it wasn't a pained scream per say and there didn't appear to be too much damage to their bodies; the same could not be said about their devices. Cracks appeared on the overall frame of Bardiche and Raising Heart.

"Fate!" Arf shouted out in grave concern for her mistress, she set herself in a position to be easily able to jump to the girls' aid should it be needed.

"Nanoha!" Sonic and Yuuno equally shouted in concern of the latter girl.

The resulting explosion added a huge burst of light and a shockwave that sent both Fate and Nanoha out and away from where they clashed.

* * *

><p><strong>[Opening: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 9<br>More Mages?! A mysterious authority; are they friend or foe?!**

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Urban District, inside a barrier]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Both girls were thrown to opposite ends of the radius from that explosion. Fate, though was off balance in doing so, somehow managed to stabilize her flight into a hover. Arf, her wolf familiar, was standing by just in case she needed help.

As for Nanoha, she wasn't nearly as graceful in her fall. Sprawling and off-balance in her descent downward, she was barely able to catch herself in a stable flight. Thankfully, she found aid in two small gloved hands pressed against her back softly. Sonic, with all of his speed and easily being able to play pepper with the sound barrier with it, caught his mage with care to keep her from any embarrassing meetings with the ground.

"Arigatou, Sonic-kun" the girl thanked said familiar. Though it was arguable that she would've been just able to catch herself in time, the effort was certainly appreciated.

"No problem." The young hedgehog replied with a modest shrug, "It's what I'm here for, aside from my quick wit."

Meanwhile, with Fate, aside from maybe a mark or two from her previous battle with Nanoha, was unharmed for the most part. The same could not be said for her device, which took a huge hit from that explosive clash and was scratched up, but otherwise appeared active."

"Daijobu, Bardiche?" the girl asked, upon receiving a faint glimmer of acknowledgement, she felt it appropriate for her to dismiss the active mode and allow said device to repair itself, "Mode Release to your standby form, please."

"_**Yes sir!"**_ although the response was scratchy and full of static due to the damage, it still was coherent. Within an instant, the device released its active mode and shifted to the yellow triangle that was its standby form. The girl, somewhat regretful that she put her trusted device through all of the damage, placed it in an open slot on her glove.

Meanwhile, the Jewel Seed was still floating there, but its glimmer was still there and worse enough, it was dangerously brighter. The chain reaction from the combined powers that came from the two mage's clash over the Seed and the Jewel Seed's own power must have overloaded it. Fate, realizing this, and feeling that she had little options left, rushed straight for the Jewel Seed with her right hand outstretched.

"Fate!" Arf, as if able to deduce what her mistress was thinking at the moment, shouted after her to try to get her to stop.

Said shout got the attention of Sonic, Yuuno and Nanoha, the former two were too busy looking over the latter's condition to be able to do anything to stop the blonde until it was far too late and the girl had the Jewel Seed in her grasp. Her hands shook hard and almost violently in reaction to the overload of power that the Seed was giving off.

"Okay, for the 64,000 yen question" Sonic asked, almost cynically, but was very much serious in doing so, "What in the world is that girl doing?!"

"It looks like she's trying to stabilize the Jewel Seed's power" Yuuno briefly explained, "That could kill her if it doesn't work right!"

"Fate! Stop!" Arf, although in vain futility, tried to get the girl to stop, "It's too dangerous!"

'_Stop!'_ Fate repeatedly shouted in her thoughts as she used her magic to try and stabilize the overflowing power from the Jewel Seed, which would allow it to be sealed safely. It nearly drained her of the energy she had, but the reaction calmed down after the energy engulfed her for a moment.

In the end result, Fate was tired and her Barrier Jacket was damaged for the most part, but she was able to seal the Seed. Struggling to get up and let alone stand on her own feet, the girl wobbled to and fro.

"Fate!" Arf rushed hard and fast for her mistress, able to quickly shift forms to her human form to take advantage of the taller body's long stride. She quickly embraced her mistress and caught her to keep her from falling to the ground.

There was a brief moment of silence until the familiar heard some noises of movement. Upon noticing the noises of movement from behind her, the wolf-familiar turned her head and glared at the trio of Nanoha, Fate and Sonic. It was an angry type of glare, but nothing of the malicious sort. Instead, this was the look of mother bear that was ready to raise her claws on anyone that would seek to harm her cub, or in this case, her mistress Fate.

"Whoa! Parley! Truce! Cease fire! White flag?" Sonic quickly took a step back, and futilely said whatever he could think of to calm the storm while Nanoha took a small step backwards, intimidated by that protective glare. The hedgehog did not stop there and almost stepped into ridiculous means, "Armistice? Red light? Yellow card? Wait a minute that last one wasn't right."

"_Sonic, you're not helping."_ Yuuno, evidently not in the mood, sent to the hedgehog in annoyance. The ferret had a serious glare, but it was aimed at Arf and Fate, he did not approve of the latter girl's choice of methods in the first place, but the latest was extremely dangerous.

Arf merely sighed and remained silent until she stood up and readied herself for a big leap. Before doing so, she called back to the trio, "Don't follow us!"

Before the trio could even answer the wolf-woman's demand; she was up on the urban district rooftops and well out of sight. The situation was quickly defused from there into silence. The damage to the overall area was extensive and Yuuno's barrier was about to run out. Needless to say, the best course of action, which was to retreat back home, was taken with little argument.

* * *

><p><strong>[Residential District, Takamachi Residence]<br>[Local time: PM 21:15 (appx 9:17 pm)]**  
><strong>[No BGM]<strong>

After the trio returned home, they informed Nanoha's family of their recent development and clash with Fate. Though it was regrettable that they were unable to claim the Jewel Seed, Nanoha was still, for the most part, unharmed, which gave relief to her family.

After dinner was finished, while Nanoha was taking a shower and getting her pajamas on for bed, Yuuno and Sonic were busy in the girl's room, though instead of raiding the girl's panty drawer like some young boys of that age would; they were observing Raising Heart's condition.

"How's it looking?" the blue hedgehog asked

"Raising Heart's a very durable device, so it can take a lot of punishment" the ferret said as he stared hard over the device, "But still, for it to take this much damage in one impact?"

"You don't think it was just from their little clash" Sonic speculated, "I thought I saw some magic sparks between the two there. Although my attention was also on Ms. Lassie"

"No, even if their powers did clash, it wouldn't be enough to cause this much damage on its own" Yuuno shook his head, "It had to have been the Jewel Seed's power."

"How powerful are these things?" the blue hedgehog couldn't help but ask, "They have to be pretty powerful to get this much attention."

"Powerful enough to cause the damage we saw tonight, that's for sure. Although this probably isn't your first encounter with powerful jewels" The ferret gave the blue hedgehog a questioning glance; with the absence of Nanoha, he felt it appropriate to bring up a topic with Sonic, "What are these "Chaos Emeralds" you mentioned to Nanoha?"

"I only mentioned those to her once and that was during your own lecture of the Jewel Seeds" Sonic, visibly annoyed at the Tutorial Ferret, countered the question and glare with one of his own, "How much did you hear?"

"6 jewels confirmed with a seventh rumored." Yuuno, with an almost photographic memory to match his young talent and intellect in archeology, "Evidently they're from the South Island archipelago where you coincidentally came from. There had been no mention of these jewels in the news reports. So the only way for you to know about these would be firsthand experience, am I right?"

"Maybe I know of them, maybe I don't. I don't think it matters" Sonic glared at the ferret, feeling the need to be defensive as this was starting to look like a stereotypical interrogation, "So why should it matter to you? Why do you want to know?"

"The Jewel Seeds are dangerous enough" the ferret argued, not one to back down until he attained the truth from the blue hedgehog this time, "And if by chance they end up near your islands, if their power mixes with these other emeralds, it could mean devastating results."

"Well then you have nothing to worry about. The emeralds aren't here" the hedgehog said, not willing to divulge too much information, "So chill out."

"Really?" Yuuno found his patience pushed to the limit with the uncooperative hedgehog familiar. He was too worked up to notice some movement behind him such as a door opening, "How am I supposed to take your word for that? You've been avoiding every chance to talk about your past up until this point, so- ugh!"

The Tutorial Ferret's statement was cut short when he was blindsided by what appeared to be a small cookie. From the doorway, Nanoha stood in her pajamas with her left hand extended. She was carrying a tray that had two glasses of milk and two piles of cookies organized on it for a before bed snack. She might have just thrown one of the cookies she had, but she didn't care for that at the moment. She calmly set the tray down on her desk before giving both ferret and her hedgehog familiar to a very serious glare that held concern and some annoyance in her expression.

"Two things" the girl said sternly after making sure she commanded their attention, "One: No arguing in my room. Two: I thought I made it clear that Sonic-kun's past was off limits until he felt comfortable with talking about it."

"Why are you taking his side on this?" Yuuno asked the girl, "You know he mentioned these "Chaos Emeralds" to you and they had to have been important otherwise he wouldn't have mentioned them. Why are you allowed to hear these things from him while I'm apparently not?"

"Because- Mmmph!" the blue hedgehog started to say, but found his mouth quickly silenced by Nanoha's palm. Sonic was visibly annoyed by his mistress's action as he felt he could've held his own. The temptation to stick his tongue out and lick the girl's hand did cross his mind; but then again; so did the serious look that the girl had sent to her familiar clearly requesting to let her to handle it. Not one to be ungrateful for the effort taken for him, Sonic kept his mouth shut for once.

"He doesn't trust you enough yet; and interrogating him on this isn't going to help him trust you " Nanoha, not one to back down in defense of her familiar, answered, "I don't think he was lying when he said we're safe from the emeralds, and that should be good enough for you too. We have other things to worry about right now"

For that moment there was a silence and it made Yuuno rethink how he regarded the blue hedgehog and his past. He had really given Sonic no reason to trust him while Nanoha had earned his trust by reaching out to him and saving his life. If he was going to get Sonic to open up about his view, he'd have to become his friend like Nanoha did.

"You're right.." Yuuno let out a defeated sigh; he really felt like a jerk, and he frankly was a few minutes ago. He had let his own frustrations affect his attitude and it rightfully rubbed Sonic the wrong way, "Sorry about that, Sonic.."

"It's fine. I'm not exactly too happy about letting those two get away with another Seed either." The blue hedgehog shook his head then gazed at Raising Heart, "This little thing has seen better days"

"Will Raising Heart be okay?" Nanoha, feeling concern for her trusted device, asked.

"It took extensive damage from that impact, but it'll be fine" Yuuno answered, "It has an automated regeneration system working. So it should be back to perfect condition by tomorrow."

"Wait.. These devices can regenerate?" the hedgehog just stared for a moment, "As in repair themselves? Automatically? Wish I could do that"

"The wonders of magical technology" Yuuno had another one of those rare moments where he could have some fun at the hedgehog. But instead of relishing it like he knew the hedgehog would, he decided to come up with an offer that could help his standing with Sonic, "However, I can teach you and Nanoha through extension, a few healing spells I know."

"That would be helpful" Sonic grinned, knowing that Yuuno made that offer just to play kiss up, but was going to give him the chance to do it anyway as he was starting to like the ferret, if only because he was able to have some fun with him, usually at said ferret's expense, "Never know when we're going to be in a pinch where our trusty Tutorial Ferret can't help us out of."

"At any rate" Yuuno diverted his attention to Nanoha, "How are you holding up, Nanoha?"

"I'm fine…. Because Raising Heart protected me" the girl stared down at the device, unable to restrict the feelings of regret that she had for letting Raising Heart take that much damage at once, "Gomen, Raising Heart."

The device did not respond to its master vocally; however it did flicker pink for a moment.

* * *

><p><strong>[Local DateTime: Same time, same day]  
>[Uminari City, Residential district]<br>[Fate Testarossa's Apartment]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

For Fate, while her risky method of calming the energy of the Jewel Seed had worked; it did not come without consequence or injury to her own body. In this case, her hands suffered serious burns from directly holding the seed in her grasp. She sat there on the couch in her apartment room, clad in her Barrier Jacket but had her gloves off so her hands could be tended to by Arf.

Cautiously, but with no need of assistance, probably as this wasn't the first time she's done this, the wolf familiar sprayed some antiseptic on the burned right palm. Taking a peek at her master's face before continuing on, she noticed that the girl had a neutral expression, not one full of too much emotion. Arf was starting to apply the medical gauze and tape to finish up the burn bandage when she heard and felt her mistress wince and flinch her hand.

"Gomen Fate" The wolf familiar apologized, "We're almost done"

"I'm fine" Fate calmly and softly assured her familiar with a glance and a small smile, "Arigatou, Arf. I have to report back to kaa-san on my current status, so I'll have to get better. If I went home in this condition, she'll be worried for sure, right?"

"Right… that woman would worry about you" Arf looked away slightly from Fate. Her face and expression was full of skepticism and deep down in her mind; even further than Fate could read, she had a lingering thought of, _'As if!'_

"Kaa-san is just a little awkward after all" Fate said, softly and honestly, as if that was how she felt about her, "I can tell, deep down how she really feels towards me."

"If it's just to deliver a report" Arf, having that same feeling of foreboding she had whenever it was time to make a progress report home, "It would be fine if I could go alone."

**[BGM Insert: "Daijoubu da yo" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

"Kaa-san never really did listen to what you had to say, did she?" Fate asked, though she knew the answer anyway. She waited for her familiar to stand up and sit straight down on the couch before she softly stroked the wolf-woman's head with her bandaged hand, "Even though you're such a kind, good girl.."

"W-well… I'm sure tomorrow will turn out fine. I mean, in the small amount of time we've been here, we've already captured four Lost Logia.. Er Jewel Seeds. She should be completely full of praise for you since there's no reason for her to be angry, right?" Arf blurted out rapidly, but clearly; as if she was trying to convince herself of what she was saying before convincing her own mistress of it. Although, deep down, that foreboding feeling remained, and it worsened for her in fact and it put her in something of an internal battle, _'Who am I kidding?! I know how this is going to end already.'_

"Yeah" Fate, oblivious to the inner turmoil of thoughts, agreed to the familiar's reasoning, "You're right."

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Residential District, Takamachi Residence]  
>[April 27<strong>**th****, AM 06:15 (6:15 am)]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The sun had barely started to rise on this early spring morning as Miyuki and Sonic had ended their routine morning jogging route at the dojo. This was an everyday thing for the girl and hedgehog and it had started a few days after Sonic agreed to train under her in her family's style.

The two were dressed fitting for an exercise; although Sonic was only in his trademark shoes and gloves. As for Miyuki, while her glasses certainly can give her that bookworm look; they did little justice. During her workouts and training sessions, she would take them off, tie her hair back with a bow and don an outfit of jogging pants and shirt. In doing so, she showed to be well more than just the pretty face as she had a very athletic and slim figure, definitely one that could attract the gaze of a fair amount of male and female interest.

"Ah! Nothing like a quick, easy jog to get you pumped up for training" the girl said as she caught her breath and stretched her arms quite a bit to loosen up for more, "Good job, Sonic-kun"

"Nothing to it" Sonic shrugged, not feeling winded or tired in the slightest, but had a lot of adrenaline built up from the jog, "So, "sensei", what are we working on today?"

"I was actually thinking about working on your defenses, now that you mention it." The older sister of Nanoha giggled a bit on the mischievous side, since her pupil had decided to address her so teasingly about their teacher/pupil status. She knew that he'd listen and absorb whatever she could teach him about her style and apply it appropriately, but she wouldn't pass up the chance to give her pupil some karma for the snarky attitude, "I hope you're ready"

"Sure, sure, I'm ready" the hedgehog nodded bravely, "and busted."

The teen giggled a bit before opening the sliding door into the dojo. Inside it was spacious and well lit, and not just with the windows on the side walls that let part of the sunlight, minus most of the glare, in. There were wooden training swords alongside one of the walls. The sizes ranged from the short blade kodachi to the long blade katana, but for Sonic and Miyuki, their weapons of training were the twin kodachi. While it wasn't uncommon for some of the other family members to join in on the training, it came to Miyuki's surprise when she saw Nanoha leaning against the wall.

"Ara?" the older sibling blinked and addressed the pig-tailed girl, "Nanoha"

"Ah, onee-chan" Nanoha stood up and equally addressed her sister and familiar in return, "Sonic-kun."

"You sure are up early" Miyuki observed, "What's up?"

"Well.." the girl let out a sheepish giggle, "My eyes just felt like opening this early, I guess."

"I see…" If there was one trait Miyuki had that fitted her elder sibling status, it was her ability to note how honest her younger sibling was with her. In the current case, wasn't so easily fooled. She had a feeling that, after what she was told about last night's events, that Nanoha didn't just randomly wake up at 6 in the morning, but she let the girl say her piece.

"Ano.." Nanoha looked around to see if there was anyone behind the two, "Where's onii-chan?"

"He's out long distance running with otou-san this morning" Miyuki explained as walked over to the wooden blade stands and grabbed a pair of her usual twin kodachi and set them aside before skillfully tossing her hedgehog pupil another pair, "Catch."

"Got them" Sonic caught them easily without letting the blades touch the ground. He twirled them around for a bit before settling into a relaxed standing position, "Ready"

"Ano…" Nanoha softly interjected between the two, having a rather serious request to make, "If it doesn't bother you two… would it be alright if I watched?"

"Well.." Miyuki chuckled a bit, "I don't think it'll be all that interesting to watch."

"Awe come on; she must've known you were going to kick my butt and probably wanted to watch" the hedgehog grinned teasingly sending those looks to Nanoha and her sister, "My cruel master would just love to see her familiar get his tail royally kicked.."

"Mou…" Nanoha pouted, knowing full well that Sonic was messing with her and not even she was exempt from his snarky attitude, "Sonic-kun, you meanie."

"Well, if that's the case, then I can't disappoint her" skillfully and without pause, Miyuki flipped one of her kodachi blades then gripped the blade firmly, "You can watch if you want"

"Okay! Nanoha happily chirped, "Arigatou!"

**[BGM Insert: "Star Light Zone" Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis)]**

Seated on the wood floor on her knees, Nanoha watched carefully as Miyuki and Sonic warmed up their sword training routine with some practice swipes. Miyuki would take a few clean, swift strikes at the air and then would watch as Sonic tried the same thing with almost the same precision. The purpose of this exchange was not to practice the hedgehog's speed of his swings as his own speed wouldn't make that an issue. It was his balance and momentum that needed the work.

From Nanoha's perspective, it was the first time that she was able to watch how the morning training for her familiar's swordplay turned out. So far, albeit with the small amount of time, she actually found it interesting. It was more than just sword strikes, there was a bit of finesse and fluidity in the art, and she saw Miyuki almost drill that in as she instructed. It didn't take long for her sister to turn on Sonic and start working on his defenses and guarding skills and it was during that time that Yuuno woke up and contacted the two via the mindspeak

"_Nanoha? Sonic?" _The aforementioned Tutorial Ferret sounded like he was just about waking up as well when he called the two, _"Is there something wrong? You both are up early"_

"_The hedgehog you are trying to reach is unavailable. Please leave a message after the tone"_ Sonic answered, and he probably would've been mentally cheering for victory had he not been busy fending off Miyuki. Heck he even left his own beep tone, _"Beep!"_

"_What Sonic meant to say is that he's in the middle of the morning training with Miyuki-onee-chan"_ Nanoha, who had almost thought about asking Yuuno if it was possible to have an answering machine in a mindspeak conversation, but then remembered who her familiar was and declined to ask, _"And I just woke up this early, that's all."_

"_I see"_ the ferret found the hedgehog's answering machine impression somewhat cute if not a bit on the entertaining side, _"Any reason why you woke up early?"_

"_Well, actually; I've been doing a lot of thinking lately"_ Nanoha confessed one reason rather quickly. Noting that the only two she knew were still listening in, though with Sonic busy getting his tail handed to him on the pretext of defensive techniques; which while the girl found humorous, knew she wouldn't get his input until later, _"It's about that girl… Fate-chan, I'm really curious about her."_

"_Curious?"_ Yuuno asked her. Sonic would've asked something as well if he wasn't too busy blocking another practice swipe form Miyuki.

"_She's so strong…And even though she seem so cold… she has such kind, beautiful eyes" _Nanoha clarified with the two of her meaning over the mindspeak; she had received silence on both ends. Little surprise to her, she probably gave Yuuno a lot to recall, while Sonic almost got his tail whacked by a wooden sword, _"Yet, for some reason… she looks incredibly sad.. Almost like she's lonely."_

Nanoha's internal observations about Fate brought about conflicting feelings between the ferret and her familiar. Sonic had a similar feeling that she had about the two, and if Nanoha could guess, she'd say it came from fighting the wolf-woman familiar, Arf. She didn't know much about the magic and familiars, but if Arf and Fate had any emotional bond similar to hers and Sonic's, she'd guess that Arf could feel that loneliness from Fate. But she'd have to wait until the morning training concluded before she could get that confirmation from Sonic.

As for Yuuno, he couldn't tell what to think, on one hand, he disagreed with how brutal and borderline reckless Arf and Fate were with how they went about the Jewel Seeds. On the other hand, however, he wasn't one to talk either as he had jeopardized the lives of two civilians from a world that shouldn't have been involved in the first place. Were it not for Nanoha making Sonic her familiar, he would've died and Yuuno would've had that on his conscious. He still refuses to allow himself to get over it despite the efforts by the hedgehog and girl to help him. His internal musings were halted again as Nanoha continued her thoughts.

"_I really believe she has a reason for doing all of this. Her reason for collecting the Jewel Seeds…"_ Nanoha sounded so sincere, and at the same time, full or resolve as she continued, _"I want to talk to her.. So.. In order to do that, I'm going to…"_

Her thoughts trailed off as she saw Miyuki continually strike against Sonic. The hedgehog, for the most part, was able to deflect the majority of her practice strikes. She saw that he had a tough time doing so as Miyuki kept a firm momentum and rhythm in her approach. But there was something about Miyuki's final strike that made the younger sister stop her chain of thought altogether. Something that she hadn't seen until she saw it from the side view; and that was the expression on Miyuki's face.

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Residential District, Rooftop of Fate Testarossa's Apartment]  
>[Local datetime: Same day, AM 08:17 (appx 8:17 am)]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Meanwhile, for Arf, her internal chain of thoughts continued as she waited for her mistress, who had apparently went out for a quick stop for a souvenir before returning home. Despite the thought conflicts, she was able to agree that she couldn't leave things the way they were. Though, on that note, what could she do?Who could she turn to for help? The ideas about her newest rivals crossed her mind before she could stop herself.

'_That other girl; she was so innocent, but could she have meant what she said earlier? I can't just go out and talk to her directly yet. I need another opinion. The ferret seems like the type to annoy me with a lecture. But, what about that blue one? I know that he's her familiar, but what's his own stake in this? Wait… why am I even considering them?!'_ Arf finally stopped herself from going any further. If her master caught any hint of these thoughts, she might feel betrayed if her familiar went to seek aid from the other side. Although that thought brought about another thought, was it really betrayal if what she did turns out to save her master's life? She didn't get any further though, as she took notice of her master finally showing up on the rooftop.

"Ah! Fate!" she took notice of the small box of sweets that was in the girl's hands, "What would this be?"

"Souvenirs" Fate, oblivious to her familiar's conflicting thoughts again, answered softly and kindly, "I thought kaa-san might like them."

"Sweet candies, huh?" the wolf woman held up the box in one hand so she could use the light from the sun to see the shadows of the contents through the box, "Would these really make that woman happy?"

"I don't know, but it's the thought that counts for this kind of thing" Fate was unsure of her actions herself, but sounded confident enough to go through with it, "ne?"

"I guess.." Arf sighed, knowing she couldn't talk her master out of this, _'I'll leave it up to chance this last time. If it doesn't work, I may have no choice.'_

"Dimensional Transfer for two; dimensional coordinates: 876C-4419-3312-D699-3583-A1460-779-F3125." The blonde declared, clearly and coherently without a trace of emotion, knowing that any slip of the coordinates would be troublesome. As she did so, her yellow magic circle appeared to surround a small diameter just big enough for herself and Arf, "Open, O Door of Invitation to the Garden of Time! Take us to the household of the Testarossa family!"

Within a matter of seconds, the magic flared up in response to the girl's spell declaration and request. The two were engulfed in a yellow flash of light before they were quickly whisked away in the magical transportation spell.

Whether it was the burst of magic, or the clouds that engulfed the mid-morning sun, Nanoha paused in her trek to school as if she noticed of something happening. At the same time, Sonic, who was cleaning himself up of the sweat he built up from training in the shower, and Yuuno; who was busy watching the morning news report, both paused as if noticing the same thing. Despite that, the trio didn't dwell on the feelings.

* * *

><p><strong>[Within Dimensional-Time-Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[Local datetime (following Earth's clock): Same day and time]  
>[BGM: "Gin no Tsubasa ~Asura" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Deep within the reaches of space a silver, medium-sized ship flew. The overall layout was similar to that of a cruiser spacecraft, only it had a large wingspan which resembled two tips of a spear with a gap in the middle, like a pitchfork without the middle point. The ship was armed with weaponry appropriate to its title, but for cruising purposes all were inactive. The ship flew at a speed similar to what some may call light or warp speed, regardless, the speed was appropriate to cover large distances of space in such short time.

In the cockpit area of this patrol warship, several uniformed officers manned a few of the controls or heads-up-display information. As these individuals worked, they were soon joined by another.

This woman appeared young, but not too much so at around 31. She had long light-bluish hair with a touch of green, tied up in a long ponytail that hung from the top of her head to almost the small of her back. She had a lovely, fit figure that would've been any sort of clue as to how well she takes care of herself. Her uniform consisted of long, white pants, dark-bluish heeled boots that were matched by the long, official coat that had either a badge or insignia on the left forearm. She was certainly not dressed casually as the necktie on the collared shirt of her uniform was of any indication.

"What's our status people?" The woman asked in an almost motherly tone that could only add to her aura of authority and experience, "Are we still on the proper heading this time?"

"Hai, ma'am." One male glasses-wearing uniformed officer answered without missing a beat, "Presently we're cruising at a constant level three nautical velocity and we should be arriving at the target destination within 160 vecs."

"There hasn't been any movement to note since the relatively small-scale dimensional disturbance" the other male tech answered, "However, there's still an extraordinarily high chance of those two individuals clashing again."

"Well" the woman calmly sat down on her desk chair, "Is that so?"

"Excuse me, Captain Lindy" a young, appx 16 year old, girl with short brown hair and clad in a similar, if not female variant, of the other uniforms, "Your tea is ready."

"Arigatou, Amy" the woman, Lindy Harlaown, Captain of the Asura and an Admiral from the Time-Space Administration, thanked her youthful assistant and took her tea, "Even though this last one was on a small scale, the fact that these dimensional disturbances are occurring at all are troublesome. Especially on the worlds like our destination, where we hold no official presence"

"If I may, Captain; if another one of these disturbances happen, we'll just have to make sure we're right there" a 14 year old boy with dark-bluish hair, clad in a dark-blue and black attire with spikes on the shoulders offered. The boy was identified as Enforcer Chrono Harlaown, who just happened to be the captain's only son. The young teen's tone did little to conceal any confidence he held as he held up what appeared to be a card, "After all, that's why I'm here in the first place, is it not?"

"You are correct there, Chrono" the admiral nodded and countered with a confident expression of her own, surprising her son greatly when she held up a card of her own, "But don't assume that I'll be letting you go out there on your own and take all of the fun away from me."

"Yes, ma'am" the boy sighed in defeat, silently hoping his own mother would keep it professional enough not to embarrass him out in the field.

* * *

><p><strong>[High Dimensional Time Space]<br>["Garden of Time"]  
>[BGM: "Chi no bakukusari" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

The actual Garden of Time would've probably been a misnomer if one were to look at it up close. It looked nothing like any garden one would find. It was a small, asteroid-like structure hidden well in the outskirts of the Dimensional Space, well beyond the range of any sensor. It was this place that served as the "home" of Fate Testarossa along with her mother and familiar.

Though there was little noise from the halls of this place, for Arf, though, there were two only noises that she dreaded to hear. The first sound was that of a whip making sharp and painful contact on something, or someone; the second noise was a young girl's cries of pain. Those were the noises that she heard now, and dreaded them because they were the cries of her own master; whipped in punishment by her own mother.

Inside of the main room, Fate was held in place by binds of darkish purple magic. The bindings held her wrists and made her spread her arms out wide while her feet dangled pitifully. She was held in the center, while ahead of her was a throne, in which a woman stood.

This woman had long graying purplish hair that just flowed with no restraint. She was tall and, despite being at the ripe old age of 54, looked pretty well fit. Her outfit, despite being a longish dress-like robe and matching cloak, had gaps in the hips, chest and belly area to display some of the exposed skin. In the woman's hand was a device that had a purplish magic generated whip.

"Only four?" the woman admonished darkly, lashing at poor Fate with two more strikes of her whip, "I'm truly disappointed in you."

"H-hai.." Fate nodded weakly, just submissively taking the punishment with not even a thought of fighting back. This must have gone on for a while already, as the poor girl's Barrier Jacket showed cuts in where the whip had struck her. Her gaze was downward and she appeared apologetic, "Gomen-nasai… kaa-san."

"Do you understand, Fate? You are my daughter; the sole offspring of the Great Mage Precia Testarossa" the woman, identified as Precia Testarossa, slowly approached her magic bound daughter. The whip in her right hand shifted forms to a long, tall staff. When she was within arms' reach, the woman lifted the girl's chin up to gaze into her face, "Nothing is impossible for us; no matter what it may be. Yes… we must complete everything we begin, in all respects."

"Hai.." Fate said submissively in acknowledgement; knowing that she had crossed her mother again.

"You've made me wait longer, only for these meager results.." Precia continued to almost lecture darkly; thoroughly upset with her daughter's performance, "I cannot welcome you back home with a smile, even if you wasted time to bring me a gift. I trust that you understand, Fate."

"H-hai.." Fate softly acknowledged again, "I understand."

"That's why…that's why I want you to remember" Precia said as she let go of the girl's chin, "So that you may never disappoint me again."

It took less than a second for the staff in Precia's right hand to transform back into the whip, but it took even less than that for Fate to react. Gasping in fear, the poor girl shut her eyes tight and waited for the inevitable blows that were to follow.

The whipping noise and Fate's screams resumed, only far quicker and Arf, who was helpless to do anything about it, could only press her hands firmly against her wolfish ears. Sadly, her efforts were in vain, and she had to endure the painfully horrible noises that came from that throne room; the noises that were like hell for the Familiar to listen to.

"What the hell?! What the hell is wrong with her?! That woman is too cruel" Arf, who knew full well that this was the norm of what would happen when she and Fate had to return home for progress reports, found even her own tolerance thinning and she bolted to the opposite end of the hall, and placed her hands against the closed door.

'_That woman! She claims to be Fate's mother… this is far from the first time she's been cruel to Fate, but… It's just too much this time! What the hell is wrong with her?! Are the Lost Logia… the Jewel seeds, worth all of this?!'_ Arf screamed in her thoughts as she used that large door to support her hands, despite not feeling even a fraction of Fate's physical pain, _'Moreover... what the hell is wrong with me?! I'm supposed to be Fate's familiar, and I'm allowing this to happen to her!'_

There was a pause in the whipping noise and that took the wolf woman out of her thoughts for a brief moment to listen in on what Precia had to say this time.

"The Lost Logia are essential to the fruition of my dreams." The woman informed Fate

"Hai, kaa-san" the girl acknowledged.

"They're essential to everything. The purity of the Jewel Seeds goes far beyond any other substance" The woman continued, "You're a kind girl, so you may hesitate when trying to collect them, but… if something gets in your way, destroy it; through any means necessary! You have the power to do so within you."

Feeling that her message was conveyed and the appropriate punishment was dealt, Precia shifted her whip back to its staff form and dismissed the bindings on her daughter's wrists. Knowing that the girl was awake despite the limp way she landed on the ground, the woman made her final order.

"Now go, bring me the Jewel Seeds, my daughter!" Precia declared her order to be final, "My charming, kawaii, Fate."

"H-hai…" despite all of the pain from the deep lashings and her body almost practically shouting at her to stop, Fate managed to get on her knees and elbows in a pitiful kneeling stance, "I'll be going then.. kaa-san.."

"I shall rest for a while" the woman declared as she turned her back on the girl, "Next time, be sure to delight me with your offerings."

"Hai…" Fate acknowledged softly and silently watched her mother leave the throne room. She took one moment to gaze in the direction of her mother's throne chair.

On the table next to that throne was the box of delicious sweets, the ones she bought earlier that morning before leaving. In spite of her thoughts, that box was still there, untouched, as if it wasn't even a passing thought in her mother's mind. Hoping that maybe her mother would come back for them later, Fate turned to leave the room herself.

**[BGM Insert: "Kizuna, shinjite" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Arf had finally started to figure out what her next move was when she saw her master "walk" out of the throne room. The poor girl looked even worse than what her screams earlier could indicate. She barely walked without a noticeable limp and she had fresh marks, cuts and lacerations almost everywhere on her body. With all of what happened, it was a wonder that she was even able to stay conscious!

"Fate!" the wolf woman nearly sprinted to intercept her master in stride, stopping her before she could tax her body even more from walking, "Gomen! Are you alright?!"

"Why.. why are you apologizing, Arf…?" Fate softly asked her familiar, "I'm.. perfectly fine… really"

"But… if I had known something like this would happen; even after you got what she wanted, I never thought she'd do something this cruel to you…!" Arf said to her, finally speaking a majority of her mind, "If I had known, I would've stopped you, no matter what!"

"It wasn't cruel…" Fate softly said with a small smile, "Kaa-san was thinking of me when she did this."

"Yeah, right!" Arf almost scoffed at that, "That was cruel and unusual punishment!"

"Iie.." Fate softly countered, "After all, we're mother and daughter… I'm sure the Jewel Seeds are really important to kaa-san. She was always full of sadness, and I wanted to do something that would help her"

"But… even so.." the wolf woman had just about the end of her patience with the status quo, _'That does it! I won't let her be harmed like this again! I'm going to protect her!'_

"Arf.. . Onegai.." Fate softly pressed her right hand against her familiar's cheek, "Once I return every Jewel Seed, even kaa-san will smile again… She'll go back to the one she used to be, and I'm sure she'll even be kind to you, Arf.

"Now… Let's go…" Fate declared as she donned her cloak again, "We won't fail kaa-san this time.."

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari City, Japan]  
>[Public Seishou Auxiliary Elementary School]<br>[Grade 3, Class 1]  
>[Local DateTime: April 27****th****, PM 13:32 hours (appx 1:32 pm)]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Nanoha easily conversed with Suzuka about the recent tests that came up in class. Even though it was challenging to juggle her Elementary School, Cram School and her assistance with the Jewel Seeds, the girl was still able to keep her grades up. Her work ethic, while it impressed Suzuka, it drew some concern that she could be trying too hard. Taking a chance, Nanoha had turned her head to look in Alisa's direction, only for the dirty-blonde to give some acknowledging nod and a tsunderish huff.

"Alisa-chan…" the brunette sighed a bit in defeat.

"Don't worry, Nanoha-chan" Suzuka tried her best to keep her friend in high spirits, "She'll come around soon, I'm sure."

"Thanks.." Nanoha let out another sigh, but at least was somewhat inspired more

The rest of the school day went without much issue on Nanoha's end.

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Urban District]  
>[Local Datetime: Same day, PM 16:10 (appx 4:10 pm)]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Upon a random rooftop, two individuals stood Fate and Arf, the former clad in a cut-free version of her Barrier Jacket, and the latter shape shifted into her wolf form. The two gazed out into the city, as if looking for something, and they probably were. Out in the city somewhere was the next Jewel Seed, waiting to be activated.

"Bardiche?" Fate spoke to her standby form device, embedded in a gem on her right glove, "How are you feeling?"

"_**Recovery complete" **_came the male voice's reply from the device.

"I see. You really gave it your all." Fate greatly complimented her device with that soft, sweet tone of hers, "You're great."

"I can sense it…" Arf said as her wolf form's ears twitched, "Even I can tell that it's around here."

"Hai.. it'll soon be activated" Fate agreed, "And it's very close."

"I have a feeling we'll run into the other three again." Arf added in regards to the possibility of their rivals; she had to suppress the wishful thinking part of her tone, _'I'm counting on it… I have questions to ask.'_

"It's no matter… If they come, let them." Fate said calmly and almost coolly, "They have Jewel Seeds of their own as well."

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Urban District]  
>[Local datetime: Same day, PM 17:05 (appx 5:05 pm)]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

It was another of the days where Nanoha Takamachi hadn't had Cram School and he best friends had lessons. Instead of taking the long walk, however, she opted to take a bus. Still, she was all alone to disembark from the bus. Or at least she thought so, and she was in for a little bit of a surprise to find two individuals waiting for her.

Sonic, with the resident Tutorial Ferret, Yuuno Scrya, on his shoulder and Raising Heart, appearing free of cracks and in standby form, twirling attached to the necklace that the blue hedgehog had twirling on his gloved fingertip.

"Oh!" Nanoha almost started back with a surprised expression, "Yuuno-kun, Sonic-kun."

"Yo" the blue hedgehog greeted her with a small grin. He stopped twirling Raising Heart on his finger, only to grip it and lightly toss the gem in the girl's direction, "Catch"

"E-eh?" the girl was caught by surprise, but recovered quickly enough to catch the Standby form device in her hands. It didn't take her long to realize what it was that Sonic tossed to her, "Raising Heart! You're all better now, right?"

"_**Condition green!"**_ the device chimed almost sounding chipper and happily

"I'll give it my all again today" Nanoha, her tone full of that determination and drive, said to her device, "Will you do the same for me too?

"_**All right"**_ Raising Heart confirmed, _**"I will give you my best, my master"**_

"Before you ask" the hedgehog interjected, having a hunch that she'd ask him the question as well, "I'll promise you my 100%. Don't know if I can say the same about our Tutorial Ferret"

"Oy!" Yuuno had the sense to appear annoyed, though he was sadly starting to get used to the hedgehog's teasing, "I'm not going to hold back either."

"Arigatou" Nanoha softly said to them all, "All of you.."

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Uminari Seaside Park]  
>[Local Datetime: April 27****th**** PM 18:24 (appx 6:24 pm)]  
>[BGM: "Raikou Shuurai" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

The woods in this park seemed so peaceful here on this beautiful evening. The sunset dipped the trees in a calm yellowish hue. It almost seemed too peaceful for something bad to happen. Sadly, a new Jewel Seed would not let that happen. The gem flickered to life and spiked in power to signal such activation.

The power spike was enough to draw the attention of the mages and their familiars; no matter where they were. Though, as they were the ones closest to the area, Nanoha's party arrived first.

"Emergency barrier!" Yuuno declared his spell, "Expand!"

Yuuno's barrier expanded just as he commanded it to. The barrier expanded over a wide diameter, covering almost half of the park and warping the flow of time there so no innocents would be harmed if they so happened to be in the area. The tree, though caught up in the barrier, continued to grow until it took the form of a vicious monster. The monster itself had a large mouth and large claw-like hands that used to be its branches.

"Really? Another demon tree? I though the Jewel Seeds had originality" Sonic quipped sarcastically as he settled into a battle-ready stance, "Oh well, we could use the firewood for s'mores later."

Calmly and full of her drive, Nanoha, clad in her usual white and blue Barrier Jacket, held Raising Heart in its device form and pointed it to the possessed tree. For the most part, the possessed tree roared at the girl.

A barrage of Photon Lancers raining down upon the demonic tree signaled to Nanoha, Sonic and Yuuno that Fate had arrived. Despite the good entrance, Fate's Photon Lancers were guarded easily by a magical barrier generated by the tree.

"Wow! This one's certainly an arrogant one" Arf commented, "Putting up a barrier already."

"It's stronger than the others" Fate added in observation then noticed the presence of the other three, "That girl and her companions are here as well."

"Huh!?" Nanoha turned and gasped to see Fate and Arf behind her. If she wanted to say anything, she had to cut it short as the tree grew aggressive and lashed out several roots from the ground, aiming to crush anything that was in its path, which happened to be Nanoha, Sonic and Yuuno. "Yuuno-kun! Hide! Sonic-kun! Get away! It's attacking."

"Aye aye" the blue hedgehog didn't need to be told twice and he started to jump back-and-forth; easily avoiding the tree's roots with his speed and agility. Yuuno had retreated back to the bushes behind the white-clad mage.

"_**Flier Fin"**_ Raising Heart declared as wings appeared at Nanoha's feet and took her airborne and away from the roots of the demonic tree. Sonic, opting to go after the roots and make sure they wouldn't attack Nanoha, remained on the ground

"Arc Saber" Fate called out to Bardiche, "Let's go, Bardiche"

"_**Arc Saber"**_ the black device declared mechanically, shifting the open the ax-head of the device as it ran a blade of magic through the head. With Bardiche in said mode, Fate readied herself to unleash an attack while Arf covered her.

"Oy, oy!" Sonic called to his counterpart as he sliced roots from the tree with his twin kodachi, "If you wanted to have s'mores, you could've asked. I didn't bring enough marshmallows, chocolate or graham crackers for five"

"Who said I'd be interested in that?!" Arf countered, matching Sonic's slashing of roots with her claws; while doing so, she took the opportunity to reach out to the hedgehog via the mindspeak, _"We need to talk."_

"_That came out of left field"_ Sonic sent back in the mindspeak, _"What's up?"_

"_I need to know your stake in this"_ Arf went right to the point

"_I like mine done medium-rare"_ the blue hedgehog offered cutely

"_Not what I meant and you know it" _The wolf woman deadpanned, _"And if you don't wish to be on the wrong end of my master's Arc Saber I suggest you move within the next two seconds."_

"Huh? Whoa!" the hedgehog almost embarrassed himself by letting his squeal gain a few octaves on the girlish side as he jumped to avoid the curving arc of Fate's Arc Saber.

In no way was said saber targeting the hedgehog, he just happened to be in its path heading for the center of the demon tree. Like before, the tree generated a barrier to guard against the saber. However, doing so opened up a weak point for Nanoha to jeopardize. The white-clad mage did just that and unleashed a volley of pinkish blasts.

"Let's smash it!" Nanoha declared as she pointed the tip of Raising Heart targeted right at the possessed tree, "Divine…"

"_**Buster!" **_Raising Heart almost happily, which would've drawn a running gag of concern, chimed as it finished the spell declaration. The blast was unleashed upon the tree. Although it was guarded, there was something about the tree that Sonic took notice of as he observed the guard appear to slowly waver. Before he could say anything, he took notice of Fate looking ready to cast another spell.

"Bardiche! The girl called out to her device and stretched out her right palm

"_**Thunder Smasher"**_ the device declared as a blast of energy, almost similar to the Divine Buster, was unleashed. It too was met with the barrier, but she didn't let up on her spell.

If the pressure from Nanoha's Divine Buster wasn't enough, combined with Fate's Thunder Smasher, the spells mixed for a huge amount of damage to the demon tree's defenses; and it didn't take long for them to be broken and the tree itself to feel the pain. Within a matter of seconds, the Jewel Seed-possessed tree was engulfed in blasts of pink and yellow.

**[BGM ends]**

When all of the dust settled, the Jewel Seed floated there. The serial number read out in the Roman Numerals VII. Sonic, Arf and Yuuno, with little importance at this stage, could only watch as Nanoha and Fate prepare their sealing spells.

"I don't suppose they could settle this with rock, paper scissors." The hedgehog quipped, "How about chess?"

"Jewel Seed, serial 7!" Nanoha's reading of the Jewel Seed's serial number interrupted any musings Sonic had.

"Seal!" both Fate and Nanoha called out at the same time as the Jewel Seed was engulfed again by the combined sealing spells.

When the light settled the seed floated there, inactive and almost ready to be stored in one's device. The real question became who would be the one to claim the Jewel Seed. Fate and Nanoha, neither the type to let the past repeat itself, or in this case, collide with each other over the Jewel Seed and cause potentially another overload of power, floated in place at opposite ends of one another.

"It doesn't look like we can put any more stress on the Jewel Seed" Fate noted

"Yeah" Nanoha agreed, "If it turned out like the one last night, I'd feel sorry for Raising Heart and your Bardiche."

"Is the chess game still off?" the blue hedgehog, serving as the peanut gallery for once, offered somewhat cutely.

"As if the claim of a Jewel Seed could be so easily settled" Arf scoffed as she lowered herself in an aggressive stance, ready to charge at her blue hedgehog counterpart, _"And you still haven't answered my question!"_

"Alrighty, if you want a rumble, I won't refuse. It'll give me something to do while our girlies are probably going to be fighting" The hedgehog readied his own twin blades in a stance of his own, _"You were saying something about a stake."_

"_Yeah! Why are you out here? The girl's doing this for that ferret, whose reasons I could care less for, but what are you out here for?"_ the wolf continued as she pawed at the ground, ready to launch off, hoping she could time it with Fate's own charge, _"She's your master, but you're not like other familiars."_

"_Tutorial Ferret needed help with these Jewel Seeds. Nanoha volunteered, since I owe her my life and probably would've helped on a whim anyway. I'm helping out, simple as that"_ the hedgehog answered back, twirling his blades and crouching low, making him appear much shorter than he already was, _"Now for the 125,000 yen question; why do you want to know anyway?"_

"_N-no special reason!"_ Arf stumbled over her own words but she recovered to put on the tsundere act, _"I still don't care!"_

"_Touchy, touchy, touchy"_ Sonic shook his head and continued the patient act of waiting. He and Arf were still well within earshot of Fate and Nanoha's small pre-battle conversation.

"This changes nothing" Fate pointed Bardiche straight at her rival, "I still won't yield this match to you."

"_**Axe form"**_ Bardiche declared as it shifted from the multi-purpose sealing and shooting form back into the default axe mode.

"I just wanted to talk to you" Nanoha held Raising Heart close to her chest, "Is that too much to ask?"

"_**Device Form"**_ Raising Heart declared as it shifted from Cannon to Device form. The default form was more suited for close combat anyways

"If I win; and you understand that I'm not just some innocent little girl mixed up in all of this..." Nanoha conceded that a clash with her black-clad rival was once again inevitable, but she made one request, "Would you let me listen to your story?"

Fate allowed the other girl's words to affect her for merely a moment before she shook it off and broke into a head-on charge, heading straight for Nanoha. On the other side, Nanoha barely had a moment to react before she too rushed ahead to oppose Fate.

"No more talk" Arf, mirroring her mistress's actions, rushed right for her blue hedgehog counterpart, "Let's go!"

"100 yen says we are going to be interrupted, but okay, let's rock!" The hedgehog answered by charging in against Arf as well. His blades held ready at his sides as he did.

Both mages and familiars were set up for a dramatic showdown. Mage against mage and familiar against familiar; emotions could've been felt even from Yuuno's vantage point. The dramatic battles were just about to commence when that 100 yen bet was about to come into play. The interruptions were building in the form of two separate glyphs of Mid-Childan magic circles appearing right between the two. The one between the mages was a light bluish in color while the one between the familiars was a mint-green.

Raising Heart found itself gripped in a gloved hand while Bardiche clashed with the head of another device, this one looking much different than that of the other two. In between Nanoha and Fate appeared an unknown 14 year old boy clad all in black. The interference stopped the duo's fight altogether.

For the familiars, they were interrupted by a much older woman, albeit in her 30s with light-bluish hair. She had blocked Sonic's twin kodachi with a device of her own; this one looked more like a blue silver pole with a long pointed spear at the tip. She had also dealt with Arf's advance with a Round Shield spell in her other hand.

"Stop!" The boy, Chrono Harlaown of the Time-Space Administration, ordered to Nanoha and Fate as he held their devices in place, "Commencing combat here is too dangerous!"

"I highly suggest you to listen to what he says" the woman, Admiral Lindy Harlaown, who happened to be Chrono's mother, advised almost more firm than what her son had just ordered, "As it stands right now, this area is too dangerous to allow combat here to continue."

"Look... uh... I don't know who in the world you two are..,. but you two just made me 100 yen richer" Sonic, ever so snarky and not quite one to see the serious side just yet, informed the two newcomers, and even thanked them for their troubles, "Thank ya, thank ya very much!"

"This is a far too serious matter for that" Chrono shook his head as he started to go through his official identification, "I am an Enforcer for the Time-Space Administration, Chrono Harlaown."

"I am also a government official from the Time-Space Administration Bureau, Admiral Lindy Harlaown" Lindy identified herself as she addressed all present, "And you all have some explaining to do."

* * *

><p><strong>[To be continued!]<strong>

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

**[End of Chapter 9]**

Author's Notes: FINALLY! AFTER FAR TOO LONG! I FINALLY GOT THIS ONE COMPLETE! MY HIATUS IS OVER! YEEEEAAASUH! YEEEEES! At any rate, I really wish I could've gone through the specifics of that airship scene, but I could find absolutely nothing so I just went with the anime.. Evidently they arrived at the same day so they must've either been close or covered a lot of space fast. And here we are introduced to the Time Space Administration, the group that Yuuno did NOT want involved… he should've known better….

And finally we are introduced to the "real" antagonist in the arc. Precia Testarossa, Fate's "mother"….although I don't know what kind of a mother would whip her own child half to death just for disappointing her. And yes, I am trying to play Fate in a little more sympathetic role as she's not quite the evil antagonist some may think of her as … Poor Fate-chan.. Believe me I had a lot of problems with writing out that scene. It added yet another dark twist, which means I gotta add more humor to counter.. As for Arf, it may seem a bit out of character with how she tried to reach out to Sonic during that fight with demon firewood tree, but in some ways it is in her character. She would do just about anything to protect Fate, and if getting help from "rivals" is what it takes, so be it. Anyways, more to come soon..


	10. Chapter 10

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter of Lyrical Familiar. Welp.. Maybe I should've announced this earlier, but due to the upcoming college year, I find that I'm not going to have nearly enough time to focus on all 3 stories. So I'm going to focus on this one until the current arc while the other two are on hiatus. After that, this one goes on hiatus and I focus on Lyrical Record and Night Sky until their arcs are done and then hiatus them too to focus on Lyrical Familiar. Reason for that is because I will need to squeeze in all of my upcoming classwork too.. Anyways.. enough chitty-chatty.. lets go!

* * *

><p><strong>[Minutes earlier]<br>[Dimensional Space]  
>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]<br>[BGM: "Gin no Tsubasa ~Asura" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

The activation of the latest Jewel Seed registered a spark that was detected from the Asura's location. Data from the battle, including the Seed's possession and the transformation "Demon Tree", was actively broadcast from the devices involved as it happened. Tech experts were already hard at work in discerning the information, including attempted identifications of the individuals involved if they were available.

"It appears that the individuals who were part of the previous night's dimensional disturbance are undergoing another battle at their present location as we speak" One tech informatively declared as he typed away

"The core of the Lost Logia we've detected is rated A+" another tech added as he brought up live footage from the battle for his captain to view. The footage itself started from Fate's arrival at the scene. From one standpoint, it would appear that the actions of the girls and their familiars were not quite as, well, finesse, as one in their profession could be, "Their actions seem haphazard and insecure. As you can see, these individuals and their familiars are using their special attacks and spells erratically. Using everything they can; including the kitchen sink, if I have the metaphor correct."

"This is an emergency that will affect us on the dimensional level. We'll have to secure this Lost Logia as soon as possible" Lindy said as she stood up, holding a silver card in her gloved hand, "Enforcer Chrono Harlaown, how soon can we make it out there?"

"The transfer coordinates are already set. On command, I can go at any time, but if I may ask" the boy answered affirmatively, quickly taking notice of what his mother and captain had said, "What do you mean by "we"?"

"There are some cute girls involved and I can't trust you down there by yourself, Chrono-kun" The woman chuckled at the reaction her son had. The classic embarrassment blush, "At any rate, you know what our orders are when we transfer down to the combat site."

"Cease all hostilities" Chrono listed, with complete understanding and little pause, "and retrieve the Lost Logia."

"Don't forget to listen to their explanations" Lindy advised as she started to head for the gateway that would be used for dimensional warps with said boy in tow, "It's imperative that we understand their circumstances."

"Hai" the boy nodded as he and the woman stood next to one another, awaiting the transfer. He muttered something, but it was easily caught by his mother's good ears, "Hope you don't embarrass me.

"I could've embarrassed you further by staying behind and sending you off with a handkerchief" Lindy countered, "But I misplaced it in my office."

Hilarity aside, the two were whisked away in the Dimension Transfer with their target coordinates set for the scene of combat. If the crew had any reaction to the humorous mother/son scene, they didn't show it up front. One can't deny, however, the superiority of real office humor over cable.

* * *

><p><strong>[Opening: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 10<br>A Really Big Crisis**

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Uminari Seaside Park  
>[BGM: "Ketsudan no Toki" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Without a word between them, Nanoha and Fate rushed right for each other, ready to engage in combat. At the same time, Arf and Sonic had also rushed for each other. They were seemingly inevitable to clash against one another respectively. At least, until Chrono and Lindy intervened. They did so via appearing right between the groups; Chrono between Nanoha and Fate, Lindy between Sonic and Arf.

**[No BGM]**

"Stop!" Chrono commanded as he kept Nanoha and Fate's respective devices at arm's length. The blonde's was caught in his device while the brunette's device was held in his gloved hand, "Commencing combat here is too dangerous"

"I highly recommend you do what he says" Lindy added, keeping Sonic's blades in check with her own device while she held off the hedgehog's counterpart with a barrier, "As it stands now, this area is too dangerous for combat."

"I don't know who you two are….but you two just made me 100 yen richer" Sonic, seriously swearing he was going through déjà vu, quipped, "Thank you very much"

"This isn't the time for that" Chrono deadpanned while his mother had some trouble concealing a few of her giggles, "I am Chrono Harlaown, Enforcer from the Time-Space Administration Bureau"

"I'm also an official from the Time-Space Administration, Admiral Lindy Harlaown" the woman contained her composure to identify herself, "And you all have some explaining to do"

'_Time-Space Administration?!'_ Yuuno stared at the two new intruders in confusion, and slight annoyance as they were the last people he'd want to see, _'How did they get here?!'_

"Talk about being late for the party." Sonic groaned somewhat in annoyance as he relaxed his blades and backed off with Arf following suit from the opposite side and subtly taking the sky; taking advantage of Sonic's quippage, which held Lindy's attention and continued, "We were just starting to roast marshmallows too."

"Well, unfortunately dimensional disturbances take precedence over campfires" Lindy countered, then turned her attention to her son, "Chrono; standard operating procedures if you will."

"Hai" the boy nodded and started to calmly issue orders to the girls, "First, lower your weapons"

Confusion and surprise evident, the girls backed off from their clash. Seeing as there was little choice in the matter as the intruders did have a presence of authority about them, they followed the orders and lowered their staves. Their confusion didn't last long as Chrono had to react to a sudden barrage of Photon Lancers raining down upon him. He dealt with the Lancers via a Round Shield spell.

"Fate!" Arf called out from her vantage point, having taken advantage of the lack of attention on her to ascend up to the sky, "Grab the Jewel Seed! We need to get out of here!"

Fate, despite being taken by surprise from her familiar's actions, quickly recovered and took the sky herself. She reached out with her right hand for the Jewel Seed, which appeared to float in place with a slight flicker as if to dare on to take it. The blonde was so close and had almost gotten to it. Chrono, however, had the important advantages of experience and reflexes, and he was easily able to shoot the girl down with a volley of stinger-shot spells that scored direct hits on the poor girl and the surprise attack sent her down to the ground, injured and weak.

"Fate!" Arf shouted as she was able to catch her master just as she was about to have a harsh landing with the ground.

Lindy, somewhat shocked by the sudden turn of events, had to put the fact that she allowed herself to be distracted behind her for the moment. While her son had his attention on dealing with the blonde and familiar duo, she focused her attention on observing their rivals. The mage in white and her familiar appeared quite concerned for the two despite the fact that they appeared to be on opposite sides, something that intrigued her. However, her main concern for the moment was to capture the party attempting to escape. Conscious or not, which was why she watched carefully as her son prepared another volley of stinger spells that were sure to be the deciding blow on the blonde and her familiar.

'_They can't be allowed to escape that easily…'_ the woman thought to herself with a frown, _'We may not get their side of the story!'_

Before she could aid her son and capture the two in a binding spell, she saw the white mage and her familiar, in a burst of speed that shocked even her, step right between Chrono and the injured party. The two had taken defensive stances. They were easily able to cast a shield spell should it be needed.

"Stop!" Nanoha called out to the unfamiliar boy, spreading her arms out wide as if it would've helped.

"I'm not sure what's going on now. But this girl's hurt" Sonic added, crossing his arms defensively, "And I just dare you to come closer to her. Give me a reason to put these blades to work, they've been slicing nothing but tree roots all day."

'_These two parties were serious rivals if I read the situation right'_ Lindy, confused and somewhat intrigued, pondered in her mind, _'If that's the case, why are they going to these lengths to protect her?'_

"_I won't forget this"_ Arf sent in a brief mindspeak to Sonic and Nanoha as she took advantage of the confusion to leap up into the sky with her master on her back. The two teleported away before anyone else could do or say anything.

With a sigh, Chrono lowered his own device and slowly descended to the ground. Sonic and Nanoha were completely confused by the sudden turnaround. Understandably so, they were a little cautious when the teen male looked at them. On a positive note, Chrono didn't appear to be showing any signs of hostility to Nanoha and her familiar. That feeling was furthered when Lindy approached them with a calm expression.

"Good job, Chrono-kun" the woman said with a slight clap of her hands as she took the Jewel Seed in her hand, "It seems that the situation's calmed down now."

"Sumimasen" thy boy turned to his mother, "I let the other party get away."

"Well that's alright; we've ended their battle and secured a Lost Logia involved." Lindy calmly assured the enforcer. Her attention was then shifted to the other girl and her familiar, "We'd like to hear your side of this story; so would you mind coming with us?"

"Ano…" Nanoha, understandably nervous and confused, couldn't find much to say

"We're not going anywhere." The blue hedgehog decided to answer for her, "At least not without our Tutorial Ferret."

"Tutorial Ferret?" The answer confused the Harlaown pair and they both voiced their confusion at the same time.

Yuuno, with a sigh of some annoyance and defeat, climbed out from the bushes and revealed his presence. Still in the ferret form, the young archeologist climbed up onto Nanoha's shoulder, surprising the girl a little.

"Okay! Now we can go" Sonic declared comically to Nanoha's amusement and to lighten the mood a little.

The reactions from Lindy and Chrono couldn't get any more diverse. For Chrono, who was a more serious and task-oriented individual, he didn't quite approve of the playful humor and had the feeling he'd butt heads with the blue familiar. Lindy, on the other hand, found the jokes quite cute and humorous, then again, she had more experience and could use for some comic relief to lighten the moods. It also helped that she found the hedgehog himself quite cute. With all humor aside, the 3 mages plus snarky blue hedgehog familiar and Tutorial Ferret warped out of the area.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[BGM: "Gin no Tsubasa ~Asura" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

The group of five arrived onboard the warship successfully, though for two it was their first time utilizing a dimensional warp. For their first time in using such a method, Nanoha and Sonic couldn't help but feel a little bit dizzy. Understandably so from Yuuno's standpoint, the two, who were local to a "backwater" planet and had no prior knowledge of magic; so they weren't quite used to the usual way some mages travel over long distances. The two were able to shake it off quickly enough to follow the other three down a hall.

"_Yuuno-kun…" _Nanoha asked the Tutorial Ferret in mindspeak. She had yet to dismiss her Barrier Jacket and was nervously holding Raising Heart close to her chest, _"What is this place?"_

"_We seem to be inside a Time-Space Administration Bureau licensed ship"_ Yuuno explained quickly, _"If I could venture a guess, I'd say this is a Cruise Patrol Warship"_

"_Wanna put that in Japanese?" _Sonic added his two bits; minus the shave and a haircut, _"For those of us who don't speak magic tech?"_

"_Sorry.." _The ferret quickly apologized, realizing quickly who he was talking to, _"To put it simply, we're in a ship that's travelling in a space between dimensions."_

"_I don't know if that's so simple" _the girl noted.

"_I think Tutorial Ferret is basically implying that we are in space and we're on some government starship."_ Sonic drew an assumption from the explanation of the ferret. Not soon after Yuuno nodded to confirm the statement. Upon the confirming nod from Yuuno, the hedgehog brought out his inner geek for a moment or two.

"Space! The final frontier!" the blue hedgehog practically narrated out loud, and just about everyone else stopped. Chrono, Lindy and Yuuno were all completely confused by the hedgehog's sudden declaration. As for Nanoha, she was trying so hard to keep from bursting out in laughs; it didn't help when the hedgehog continued in a paraphrase, "We have boldly gone where no man has gone before, Nanoha-chan!"

That was the tipping point and poor Nanoha couldn't control herself anymore. She burst out into a fit of giggles and had to lean against Raising Heart in order to keep from losing her balance and falling to the ground in giggles. Understandably so, there was evident confusion from Chrono, Lindy and the resident Tutorial Ferret.

"Uh…" the older woman, having a sinking feeling that there was a private joke in there somewhere, still couldn't help but draw concern, "Are you alright"

"H-hai.." Nanoha took a moment to compose herself again. Her face couldn't hide any part of her amused reaction as she looked at her young brother/familiar next to her, "How long have you wanted to say that?"

"Eh, since we got here" Sonic answered with a cute, cheeky grin, "I wanted to say it; it got you to laugh, so we both win"

"At any rate" Lindy cleared her throat to draw attention to another matter that she noticed, which was the fact that the two were still in Barrier Jackets, "You two can release your Barrier Jackets here if they feel uncomfortable. We're in a secure area, so you'll be safe here."

"Hai" Nanoha nodded and dismissed her Barrier Jacket. Raising Heart's Device Mode was quickly released, returning it to the small gem form. Her Barrier Jacket gave way to the lighter elementary schoolgirl uniform.

Sonic, keeping quiet as he already had his gem of a joke, sheathed his kodachi blades and dismissed his Jacket. His Samurai-themed garb gave way to a pink t-shirt and light-blue shorts while his gloves, shoes and scarf remained.

"You don't have another form?" Lindy asked of the hedgehog, she meant no ill will in doing so, she was just curious, "You are a familiar."

"I do not have any other form." The hedgehog shrugged, "This cool hedgehog self is how I met everyone, and I don't plan on changing anytime soon."

"Very well" the woman nodded.

"Also…" Chrono looked down at the ferret, "Shouldn't you return to your true form as well?"

"Yeah, that's right" Yuuno admitted in some embarrassment, "I've been in this form for so long I had almost forgotten.

"Huh?" Nanoha was quickly blind sighted; could she have been unaware of the Tutorial Ferret's other form all this time?

"Oh boy…" Sonic couldn't help but grin a bit. While he didn't know specifically what the other form for the ferret could be, he had an idea or two that was based on prior interactions. If he was correct, "This will be interesting."

A small, green magic circle appeared on the floor surrounding Yuuno and he was enveloped in a light. Unsure of what to expect from it all, Nanoha and Sonic watched as the ferret's form began to change. The end result put one of the most comically surprised and cartoonish expressions on her face; and Sonic was not that far, though he had a not-so-subtle smirk on his face.

For Yuuno's true form, he went from a small ferret to a boy of around 9 years old with sandy blonde hair and greenish eyes. He was wearing a tunic over a shirt and shorts with a brown cloak. He took a moment to stretch before turning to Nanoha.

"It's been a while since you've seen me in this form, eh Nanoha?" The boy innocently asked; as if he thought that the girl had seen him in such a form before. Judging from the silence he got; that probably wasn't the case, "Nanoha? Nanoha?"

"Eh.. e-eh.. eh..a-ah." The poor girl just simply sputtered. She was completely stunned and had a ridged finger pointed at Yuuno. Sonic, who was beside her, could feel an influx of emotions that the girl had felt. The blue hedgehog had a confident feeling of what to expect from his mistress next. In preparation, he quickly gripped his ears with his gloved hands and plugged his index fingers inside.

"HOEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEH!" the girl's scream was so long and carried so well, it might've been heard from outside of the warship.

**[BGM: "Honobono" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

"N-Nanoha?" Yuuno, understandably, was a bit confused

"Y-yuuno-kun! Y-yuuno-kun! Y-you're a…" Nanoha was barely able to form coherent sentences for a moment as she pointed at the ferret-turned-boy, "Ah! What the heck's going on?!"

'_Well… that explains a lot'_ Sonic seemed to take it more in stride. Then he gained a sinister smirk, _'This will be fun…'_

"Weren't y-you just a…. No way!" Nanoha had closed the distance between herself and the boy before placing her closed fists beneath her chin and rapidly shook her head, squealing again, "Hoeeeeeeeh!"

"Ah.." Chrono stared in confusion before turning to his mother, "Did their images of each other just change?"

"Perhaps.." Lindy couldn't help but grin in amusement and watch the scene.

"N-nanoha?" the boy, in confusion asked, "When you first saw me, wasn't I in this form?"

"No, no!" the girl shook her head rapidly, "Y-you were a ferret to begin with!"

"Oh!" it took Yuuno a moment or two before he realized the fact that he hadn't shown her his true form "That's right.. I never showed either of you my true form. Sorry about that, Nanoha, Sonic"

"Y-you just surprised me.." the girl calmed down a little bit with a sigh.

"Ah.. so that's why you were freaking out so much when we were in the girls' changing room at that onsen." Sonic added, not only reminding Nanoha of that memory, but also enticing a look of complete horror from Yuuno's face, "You remember that, don't you Nanoha-chan?"

"Huh?!" the girl thought about that memory for a brief moment

'_Uhoh…' _both Lindy and Chrono thought to themselves, _'He's doomed..'_

"S-sonic!" Yuuno, flushing crimson at some of the details from that particular memory, "D-did you have to remind her of that?!"

"What else are friends for?" the hedgehog had one of the biggest smirks on his face as he had finally found the ultimate one-up on the ferret-boy, "It would've been cruel for me to forget."

"Yuuno-kun…." Nanoha said darkly; everything clicking in her head after her familiar's innocent reminder of what she recalled that the boy had seen when she had still thought of him as a ferret. With little delay, she subjected the poor boy to a harsh slap in the face, "YUUNO-KUN-NO-ECCHI!"

"S-Sumimasen.." sympathies for Yuuno as he had to endure one of the harshest punishments some perverts would receive. He probably should've been counting his stars that she had only slapped him and not tried for a kick down south. Regardless, he looked at the hedgehog pleadingly, "S-Sonic.. you.. are cruel!"

"Who?" the blue hedgehog countered, playing the cute and innocent act, "Me?"

"Excuse us.." As much as Chrono would've like to go and grab popcorn, or at least pull Yuuno aside for a man-to-man talk of comparing notes; he was still on the job, "But we haven't gotten anywhere on your story yet."

"That's right" Lindy calmly added, "My office is just down this hall, so if you'd all follow me.

"Hai.." Nanoha agreed quickly and linked arms with her hedgehog familiar, surprising him in the process, and proceeded to drag him in the direction Lindy was headed, preferably getting as much distance from the pervy-Tutorial Ferret as she could.

As for Yuuno and Chrono, they just stood silent and awkwardly so before sighing and following the latter three. The ferret-boy really wondered how that girl could take her familiar's side so easily.

* * *

><p><strong>[Office of Admiral Lindy Harlaown]<br>[No BGM]**

Nanoha and Sonic were completely taken by surprise at appearance of Lindy's office. Considering what they heard from her, they half expected an important appearing office. Instead it was full of several classic Japanese themed objects. Including, but not limited to, beautiful plants, a tea set with an umbrella overhead. It also included what is properly called a "shishi-odoshi" or a deer chaser/scare; for those who don't know of it, it is commonly called the "Thing that goes doink" in some Japanese media.

Everyone was seated on top of their knees on the soft, square mat. They were back to business again as Yuuno started off by explaining his involvement in the incident, starting with the Jewel Seeds and his discovery.

"I see.." Lindy calmly took in the information, "You're the one who excavated the Lost Logia… the Jewel Seeds as these ones are called."

"Hai." Yuuno confirmed "and I went there to retrieve them.."

"How noble" the woman complimented

"Even so" Chrono said strictly, "It was also reckless."

"I know.." The ferret-boy stared at the ground.

"Ano.." Nanoha, her confusion quickly replacing any contempt feelings had, voiced such confusion, "What are Lost Logia?"

"Ah…" Lindy thought for a moment to figure out the right words to say, "If I said they were relics of a lost world, you two probably wouldn't understand…"

"_That goes for you"_ Sonic side-commented to Nanoha in mindspeak, _"But I've heard the Chaos Emeralds have been called something similar to that as well."_

"_Let's let her explain first please" _the girl kindly requested, _"Before you jump at conclusions again."_

**[BGM Insert: "Prologue" Final Fantasy (crystal themes. Pick a game)]**

"Let's see.." The woman, oblivious to the brief side-bar of hedgehog and girl, thought for a moment before she started, "Within dimensional space, there exists a countless amount of worlds. Countless worlds that are all born and grow on their own; and among them, there existed a world that was just too evolved. Because their technology and science was too advanced, they ended up destroying their own world. All that remained were dangerous technological relics of the lost world."

"The general term given to one of those relics is a "Lost Logia"." Chrono added, "How they're supposed to be used is unknown, but depending on the user…it can harness a power high enough to not only destroy a single world, but all of dimensional space. An incredibly dangerous technology."

"We must handle those items properly, and they must be stored in a proper place for safekeeping" Lindy added, gone was her motherly attitude and it was replaced by a serious demeanor, "The Lost Logia that you three are searching for… the Jewel Seeds…are the crystalized forms of energy for dimensional interference.

"If several seeds were to be activated together, a dimensional distortion would occur and, worst case scenario…" the woman paused for a moment, "A dimensional dislocation could be created because they're so dangerous."

"_Okay, not so similar to the Chaos Emeralds"_ Sonic noted to Nanoha in mindspeak, _"Supposedly they grant unlimited power to the individual who collects them all…But when I found them, that didn't happen and they scattered themselves across the islands and back into their Special Stages again."_

"_Any idea, why?"_ Nanoha asked her familiar, curious because some of the information wasn't adding up.

"_I can only guess it's because of that rumored 7__th__ emerald" _the hedgehog mentally shrugged, _"Because, on hindsight, I could've sworn something was missing."_

"When you two fought that black-clad mage and her familiar, that flash of light was an explosion which had a huge impact on space" Chrono added, "That was a dimensional distortion, albeit on a small scale."

"A small scale?!" The blue hedgehog, obviously annoyed, asked in snarking fashion to the black-clad enforcer, "An explosion that covers half of a city can hardly be considered a small-scale."

"Maybe from your perspective " Lindy noted, timely defusing her son's growing annoyance at the interruption before he could've said anything, "But from a historical standpoint from where we're from. It can be considered such."

"Even so.. using a mere fraction of their power is dangerous on its own" Chrono noted, "However, the effect of gathering and activating several of them at once is unfathomable."

"I've heard of that happening once before…" Yuuno added in reflection, "In the year 462, following our lunar calendar, a dimensional dislocation occurred."

"We've heard of that one.." Lindy added, "Many of the adjacent worlds to that one were completely annihilated. It was a horrible tragedy that will always stain our history.

"We can't let it happen again…" the woman ended the briefing. Before she went on to her next topic she took a cube of sugar from a bowl and added it to her tea, an action that surprised Nanoha for a moment, "At any rate, I'd like to inform you that the Time-Space Administration Bureau…will take over all authority regarding the Lost Logia, the Jewel Seeds."

"It'd be best if you just forgot about what happened…" Chrono added, "Returned to your separate worlds, and continued to live your lives."

Yuuno nodded in confirmation. He was not about to disregard the orders from the TSAB so quickly just yet. The same could not be said for Sonic and Nanoha. The former looked like he was about ready to go off on some rant, but he was urged against it by Nanoha.

"But…" the girl tried to argue it herself first, "That's…"

"This incident involves dimensional interference!" the enforcer cut the girl short over what she was about to say, his interruption tested the blue hedgehog's patience further, but he didn't care, "This is not a simple matter that we could allow civilians to get involved with."

"But..!" Nanoha argued again, trying to calm her familiar down at the same time

"I don't think so.." Sonic had just about enough of the undermining and nonsense, and he voiced it by glaring at Chrono.

"Pardon?" the enforcer glared back, seeing how the hedgehog was about to react, "Did you say something?"

"Yeah, I did" Sonic countered back with his expression devoid of the comic-relief joking persona he had earlier, "And I'm wondering who in the world you think you are to tell us that we can't get involved in this?"

"Sonic-kun…" Nanoha looked at her familiar, but decided against arguing as she could feel the blue hedgehog's frustration and, in a way, understand why.

"You're walking on thin ice, familiar" Chrono, not one to take lip from someone who arguably could've been considered lower on the proverbial food chain of authority and status, cautioned the blue hedgehog, "And you best understand your place here before you stir up any more trouble."

"My place? Oh that's classic." Sonic countered, not one to back down, "And let me tell you something. This whole incident is centered on OUR home world, and if you think we're just going to sit on our tails and watch some intruding, otherworldly government come down and start calling the shots. Then you have another thing coming."

"That's enough from you both! " Lindy said sternly, easily defusing the tempers of both her own son and the rebellious blue hedgehog with her commanding presence. "I understand the frustrations here, and that we've brought this up so suddenly, so it's probably expected that you can't think so clearly. So why don't you think it over this evening and discuss it between yourselves? We'll talk about it in the morning."

"I can take you back to where we just came from" Chrono offered as he stood up, "Would that be alright?"

"H-hai.." Nanoha nodded quickly, nudging the blue hedgehog to her side, _"Sonic-kun… Onegai.."_

"_Alright.." _Sonic agreed reluctantly with a defeated sigh, _"But only because you asked."_

With probably a few grumbles from the hedgehog to respond, Chrono calmly escorted the group back to the warp gates to transfer them back down to the planet.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari City, Japan]  
>[BGM : "Yasuragi" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Yuuno, still in human form, overlooked the ocean view with Sonic and Nanoha beside him after they were transferred back from the Asura. He still felt quite regretful about keeping his human form secret from them.

"You're not mad at me about all of this.. are you?" the boy asked the two, "It didn't turn out the way I had thought.. and from one viewpoint, I could've been considered to have kept this form a secret from you both"

"I'm not mad, you only surprised me, that's all. If I had known, in hindsight, things could've gone differently" Nanoha shook her head, "We were both caught up in a misunderstanding."

"Sorry…" the boy said, "and thank you for your forgiveness.."

"You're not quite off the hook yet, Tutorial Ferret… boya… damn that's going to take some getting used to" Sonic grumbled a bit, but still not before raising a valid point to Yuuno, "Nanoha-chan is probably the most forgiving of the girls that you'll need to apologize to."

"Hai.." Nanoha added flinching a little bit in nerves, "I don't think Alisa-chan will take this too well.."

"She doesn't have to know yet…" Yuuno noted in hope, "And if it'll be more convenient, I could stay in the ferret form."

"You have a point there" Sonic noted, and even he wasn't that cruel to subject Yuuno to that torment; he had his fill of amusement when Nanoha had slapped the boy, "But you're going to have to tell them all at some point"

"At any rate" Nanoha noted as she saw Yuuno shift back into his ferret form, "We best go home and have dinner. We'll need to talk to my family about what we're going to do from here on."

With that said the trio left the ocean-view park and headed home for the evening. They had a lot of thinking ahead of them and a big decision to make.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space above Earth]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

After he had escorted the trio and saw them off to their home world, Chrono met up with Amy, one of the assistants who was already looking over the battle data collected from the recent incident.

"Sugoi! Look at these two! Their rankings have to be at least AAA" Amy admitted in awe as she reviewed their data, "And look at their familiars, I haven't seen anything like them before"

"And take a look at that girl in white. Oh~ she's so adorable!" The girl nodded, grinning a little as she decided to have a little bit of fun with the enforcer, "I think she'd be a cute date for you, while I can take that adorable blue boy."

"Amy…" The boy deadpanned, "I'm not interested in that sort of thing.."

'_That stash under his bed says differently'_ Amy grinned to herself in contradictory thought, _'He's into older girls. I wonder if I still fit that bill'_

"At any rate, to put their power in terms of numbers, both girls are easily in the 1 million range" the brunette, 16 years of age versus Chrono's 14 to put in perspective, "Almost tripling when they go all out. They easily outdo you in terms of power alone."

"You know that's not the only thing that matters with our magic" Chrono countered, "They both lack experience"

Lindy soon joined the two in the same room before Amy could embarrass the young enforcer even more. The woman, noticeably, had changed from her work uniform to a casual long-sleeved shirt and skirt outfit with a yellow scarf-like shawl-thing wrapped around her elbows.

"Captain!" Chrono addressed his mother informatively as a force of habit.

"ah" the woman observed, "You're looking at their data."

"Hai.." Chrono confirmed

"They're amazing.." Lindy noted as she tightly gripped the back of Amy's chair

"If that much magical power flowed into a Lost Logia…" the lone boy said with little pause, "There's no doubt it'll cause a dimensional distortion."

"Those kids… we can confirm why Nanoha-san, Sonic-kun and Yuuno-kun were gathering these Jewel Seeds, but…" the woman's attention focused on Fate from the battle data, "I wonder why this girl in black was gathering them as well…"

"She looked pretty desperate to me" Chrono noted from reflection, "She probably has a strong reason for doing what she's doing now.."

"And then there's the matter of Nanoha-san's familiar." Lindy noted as she gestured to the data that showcased Sonic's part against the Jewel Seed possessed tree, "The fact that he doesn't appear to have a secondary form is rare enough. But for him to utilize weapons different from his master?"

"And his attitude" Chrono noted with a frown, "I may have acted out of turn with him, but he gives me that rebellious vibe."

"And he doesn't appear to be any older than Nanoha-san" the woman nodded, "For him to have developed such an attitude at a young age. I have to wonder if there was something that happened to him in his recent past."

"That could be the case" Amy nodded, "But, if we're right, what else can we do? This world isn't part of our jurisdiction."

"We'll have to find out.." the woman sighed, "It's preferable that he comes forward before it becomes something we can't ignore."

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari City, Japan]  
>[Urban District, Apartment of Fate Testarossa]<br>[No BGM]**

The near-full moon graced the city with its calm light. In the familiar apartment of Fate Testarossa, the aforementioned girl laid down tiredly on the couch. Her left arm was half covered in bandages as a result of the Time-Space Administration's intervention and Enforcer Chrono's stinger spell.

"Don't move please, Fate!" Arf pleaded with the girl, "Now that the Time-Space Administration's involved, we won't be able to continue. Let's run away.. we can go somewhere.. where we can be alone"

"I can't do that…" Fate softly declined.

"But even though we managed to escape, that boy was a top class mage! We were lucky to get out of there" Arf argued back, "And if that boy decides to come after us, there may be no mistake. And that woman.. your own mother keeps saying all of that nonsense. She's been so cruel to you too!"

**[BGM: "Daijoubu da yo" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

"Don't speak badly of kaa-san…" the blonde softly requested.

"I will speak badly of her; because I'm so worried about you!" Arf refused, finally letting her feelings of sadness show as she covered her face and bawled, "Whenever you're sad, my heart hurts so much it feels like it's being ripped to pieces. Whenever you're crying, my eyes and nose get all watery and blurry, so much that I lose myself!

"I don't want you to be in pain or to cry anymore!" Arf locked gazes with her mistress, "Fate!"

"I guess that's because you and I are linked in mind and spirit" Fate said softly as she sat up on the couch, "Gomen, ne… If you're ever hurting, I'll be sure to stop myself from being sad, to stop crying."

"I…" The wolf woman kneel down to her knees, pressing her face against her arms on the ground, "I just want you to smile.. I just want you to be happy, Fate! Why?! Why can't you understand?!"

"Arigatou, Arf…" Fate softly replied, "But you see… I want to grant kaa-san's wish. And it's not just for her… I'm sure it's for myself as well…

"So… just a little more.." the girl softly laid her non-bandaged, right hand on top of Arf's head and patted a little, "There's only a little more until we reach the end, so will you give me your best until then?"

"Promise me" Arf requested as she locked gazes with Fate again, "… that you're not doing this just because that woman is telling you to… but you're doing your best because it's for you… and you alone… Then I'll always protect you"

"Yeah" the blonde girl nodded without missing a beat, sure of herself and her motives.

* * *

><p><strong>[Residential District, Takamachi Residence]<br>[No BGM]**

While the family ate dinner, they talked about the recent involvement of the Time-Space Administration. While Nanoha's mother and father couldn't say he felt comfortable with his daughter helping out this new party without at least hearing it from them first; they saw the determination that she and Sonic had. Too much has happened on Earth already and they were involved too much to just sit on their tails and back off this late in the game.

Nanoha and Sonic were driven to help in their own ways. For Nanoha, she had already been an inconvenience once and that as when her inaction almost caused half of the city to be destroyed, she did not want to go through that again. For Sonic, not only was it because of his debt to Nanoha, which probably was arguably long paid off by now, but he too didn't want to see any more destruction. South Island had taken enough damage from Eggman; and he'll be damned if he let his new home suffer any further if he could protect it.

While the two were talking over with the rest of the family, Yuuno went up to Nanoha's room to inform the Bureau party of their choice of action.

"We would like to help you" the ferret requested in communication with the Asura with Amy, Chrono and Lindy on the other end.

"Help us?" Chrono asked skeptically, "ne?"

"Even without me, I'm sure Nanoha's magical power will increase your strength. Her familiar also appears to have some experience as well" Yuuno explained, "They are both driven help collect the Jewel Seeds and fight against that girl.. whichever way you choose, I'm sure they'll be of a help to you."

"I see…" Lindy understood, "They've thought things over, haven't they. Very well then.. They can help us."

"K-kaa-san!" Chrono just stared at his mother in surprise before quickly realizing his slip, "Er.. Captain!"

"Let's have them help us.." the woman explained her reasoning, "I'd rather we save our trump card until we really need to use it, if possible."

"Hai" the boy sighed, knowing full well than to argue at this point.

"We have two conditions, however" Lindy stated in the communication, "For one, the girl and her familiar must place themselves in the hands of the Time-Space Administration, metaphorically speaking; and to follow our orders to the letter. Is that alright?"

"I understand" Yuuno confirmed.

Meanwhile, Nanoha and Momoko were washing the dishes from dinner in the kitchen. Yuuno had just informed Nanoha of the agreement with the TSAB, to which she thanked him for. Sonic, Shiro and Kyouya were present by the fridge and, were all dressed in a manner appropriate for training.

"Momoko; we'll be heading out now" Shiro noted, "And Nanoha-chan, would it be alright if we borrowed Sonic-kun?"

"You're going to be training him" Nanoha assumed, judging from their looks, "right?"

"Hai" Kyouya nodded, "We won't take too long.

"Very well" Momoko nodded, "Be careful"

"Yeah, as if these two will be with me" Sonic quipped, "I'm screwed."

"You'll be fine" Nanoha smiled, trusting her familiar to lighten the mood a bit and keep everyone loose, "Be careful."

"Hai" Kyouya and Shiro nodded and took off with the blue hedgehog in tow.

Miyuki, who was hustling to get out and join the training group, had slipped a little bit on her way out, drawing amused reactions to her sometimes clumsy habits. Soon it was just Nanoha and her mother in the kitchen. Well, two girls plus a Tutorial Ferret, as Yuuno had returned from his debriefing with the Bureau.

"Kaa-san.. are you sure you're okay with all of this?" Nanoha asked her mother as they were seated on the couch, "I mean, this will probably be getting dangerous; and I know I'll probably worry you."

"Nanoha-chan; I'm your mother, I'm always going to worry about you" Momoko softly assured her, "I knew from the first day that this all started that you were going to be getting involved in dangerous things; so this isn't anything new."

"Yeah…" the girl nodded

"The same goes for Sonic-kun as well; I worry about him because he's in our family now too" the woman added, "Whether he realizes this or not, he'll soon have to depend on your help more. You two started down this same path together, however long it goes or how dangerous it gets, it matters little.

"But know this" Momoko stood up and softly patted her daughter on the shoulder, "You have my strongest support. So go do what you want to do. Help this other girl that you've told us about. Do whatever you want, so long as it's nothing you'll regret."

"Hai!" Nanoha smiled instantly, "Arigatou gozaimasu!"

**[Less than an hour later]**

Nanoha, with her casual clothes on and a backpack of stuff she'll need on her back, ran down a long, winding road with Sonic and Yuuno at her side. Determination strongly present in their expressions, the trio had no clue how long their road would be; but they were going to travel down and give it everything they had.

Little did they know that Fate and Arf were soon to follow down a similar road. Not only that, but this incident was nowhere near the dramatic climax. Instead it was only the beginning; the beginning of a chain of events that would change everyone's lives forever; for better or worst.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Garden of Time]**

For the great mage Precia Testarossa, she seated herself at the throne of her realm. Her patience and time running out as she gazed that the four Jewel Seeds that Fate had left her earlier; her gaze then went down to a central circle that appeared to be something for magical scrying.

"Hurry Fate…" Precia half-demanded/half-pleaded out loud, "The promised land… Al Hazard awaits us. My.. no our.. Utopia"

The wheels and chains that powered the great machinations of destiny were spun to work. To what end, should one ask? What is this Al Hazard that Precia speaks of? Can Nanoha and Sonic truly trust the Time-Space Administration? Will Arf be able to save Fate from what could be the inevitable pain and sorrow that she may suffer in the future? To what lengths will she go for it? So many questions… and yet, the answers are unclear. Only time will tell; as so the story goes.

**[To be continued!]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]<strong>

**[End of Chapter 10]**

Author's notes: Yeah… a lot will happen now.. I'm going to solely focus on this story for now.. At any rate; I once again have to alter how I go about the story as I ran into another scene at the end there that goes completely different because I already had Nanoha's family in the know of the magic business… on a humorous ending note, who knew Nanoha and Sonic were such covert geeks?! I COULD NOT RESIST THAT REFERENCE! It may be obvious, but that reference must be identified! College starts up for me on Monday.. so I'll be busy again!


	11. Chapter 11

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter to Lyrical Familiar... so after the first week of University I have deemed myself to be royally screwed. But I shall press on! As for the story, I noticed I got a few chuckles from my little Star Trek reference in the previous chapter... it danwed upon me, why hasn't anyone else tried it? It's almost too easy a reference. At any rate, let's go on to this one. I don't own Sonic the Hedgehog or characters from that franchise, they are owned by SEGA. I also do not own Nanoha or characters from Lyrical Nanoha, Seven Arcs owns them.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[Meeting Room]<br>[No BGM]**

Normally, a debriefing with the Captain of the Asura was not an uncommon thing. This was especially expected after the recent incident that the ship's resident Enforcer and Admiral had to intervene in. However, as the meetings usually involved Bureau mages and personnel it did come to a surprise to find three kids seated together at one side of the long table, all dressed in casual attire.

It was quite the humorous sight for those, Lindy and Chrono included, who had the curiosity to look at the three. More often than not, the blue hedgehog would shift in his chair in some discomfort, albeit it looked more comical and cute versus serious. If he said anything, it was all in speculated mindspeak. The brunette next to him would reach over and pat the hedgehog on the head, like it would help matters, but it only served for more comical humor. It all toned down as the debriefing went on.

"And so..." Lindy addressed the gathering, making sure that everyone was paying attention to her; including the trio of kids in the corner, "As of 00:00 today, we've officially changed our directive to the search and retrieval of the Lost Logia, the Jewel Seeds.

"This usually doesn't happen, but we've made a special exception in welcoming the discoverer of the Jewel Seeds." The woman, still seated, gestured in the direction of the tallest of the three children, "The barrier Mage."

"Hai!" Yuuno immediately took his cue and stood up straight, "I'm Yuuno Scrya."

"And assisting him in his efforts" Lindy gestured to the brunette next to him, "A mage from the local world"

"H-hai!" Nanoha immediately stood up and folded her arms just below the waist, introducing herself as well in the process, "I'm Takamachi Nanoha!"

"And..." Lindy had to restrain a snicker when she gestured to the lone short hedgehog left, "The familiar of the local mage."

"Yup; that's me" Sonic grumbled and hopped off his chair, revealing perhaps the real reasons behind all of his comical discomfort, and that was the glaring fact that his height was almost 2/3rd of the latter two children and it glaringly showed when his head and neck barely went above the table, "Sonic the Hedgehog"

"These three here will be treated as temporary members of our staff" The woman concluded her brief explanation of the trio's presence, "They will be a big help for the mission"

"Nice to meet you all" the trio bowed briefly and politely. Unfortunately this only furthered the blue hedgehog's woes. As Sonic was a little bit too close to the table, when he bowed, he inadvertently bonked his forehead on the table, fell backwards and landed on his back.

"Uwah! Sonic-kun!" Nanoha squealed in surprise and immediately knelt down to check on her familiar, "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine... I'm fine" the blue hedgehog, thoroughly embarrassed, sat up and shook his head, "This is why I hate being short!"

Nanoha giggled a bit and pulled the hedgehog in her cute familiar into a cuddle-hug. It only furthered the familiar's embarrassment, but at least it put a grin on his face. Chrono, who had "only" been curious about the scene between the girl and her familiar; had to quickly turn away and hide a pinkness in his cheeks as he found himself briefly staring at Nanoha's cute face. Said action had earned him a dirty look from Yuuno, but neither Nanoha nor Sonic saw it.

* * *

><p><strong>[Opening: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 11<br>The Decisive Battle Above the Ocean**

* * *

><p><strong>[Time-Space Administration Inter-dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]<br>[Cockpit]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Lindy once again sat at her chair in the large room. The techs weren't at their stations so there didn't appear to be anyone else in the room aside from Nanoha, Yuuno and Sonic. The woman looked especially pleased with the assistance of the aforementioned trio. In her mind, it didn't feel right to just tell either Nanoha or Sonic to just back off and sit down lazily while there was a serious Lost Logia incident happening almost right in their metaphorical backyard. Despite that, she still kept a professional, but kind air about her.

"The Asura's equipped with highly advanced technology in its sensors. If a Jewel Seed so much as blinks, we'll be able to find it" The woman explained calmly as she took a quick glance around the screens, "When we find one, we'll send you three down there to seal it."

"Hai" Yuuno and Nanoha agreed without missing a beat, while Sonic still had some reservations about taking orders from people he didn't quite know too well.

"Oh, you're having us do all the dirty work" The blue hedgehog half-serious/half-joking, asked the woman, "Huh?"

"If you don't like it, we could easily leave you behind." Lindy noted, "And besides, you seem like the one who'd love the action."

"Guilty..." the blue hedgehog sighed in defeat. Was he that easy to read, or was Lindy just that good at reading him?

"Also..." the woman let out a soft chuckle, "You're lucky to be out there on the front lines, everyone else here has to do paperwork, and I'm sure you'd rather go off and fight some monster or the like versus sit around at a desk and write papers."

"Point taken" the hedgehog admitted again, oh how he disliked the unwinnable arguments.

"Captain" Amy Limietta, the resident cadet/assistant/ship bunny to Lindy addressed the older woman as she walked in, carrying a tray that held a cup of warm, freshly brewed tea, a cup of sugar and one of cream, "Your tea"

**[BGM Insert: "Eeto desu ne" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

"Arigatou" the woman thanked the girl as she took three large spoonfuls of sugar, added it to her tea before also adding plenty of cream. Apparently she preferred her teas to be "just" on the sweet side.

While for some, the preferences to how sweet one takes their Green Tea are on a personal preference, there are some cultures and traditions that also apply. For Nanoha, being raised in a Japanese family and being a native, she's learned some of that culture and had initially pegged the admiral as one who appreciates the culture and was impressed. Normally, the Japanese did not sweeten their tea that much. So it came to Nanoha's complete shock when she saw just how much the woman had sweetened her tea.

Sonic, who had been right next to his mistress, couldn't help but detect some of the shocked feelings the girl had. Upon his own curiosity, he took a peek up at her face and promptly had to call upon all forms of his restraint to keep from bursting out into laughs. Nanoha had just about the cutest and most comical of surprised looks. That thousand mile stare, the wide open mouth and the fact that she was rendered speechless. She was held in such a phase for a brief moment before Lindy addressed her.

"By the way, Nanoha-san" the woman had a question that she had been meaning to ask since the girl had arrived; and it was a legitimate one, no question about that, "Is your school all right with this?"

"Hai." Nanoha confirmed with a brief nod of her head and an arm gesture, "I already gave an explanation to my friends and my family gave one to the school, so they wouldn't mind."

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari City, Japan]  
>[Public Seishou Auxiliary Elementary School]<br>[Grade 3, Class 1]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

It was a nice, peaceful day for homeroom at the Elementary school. The class had almost a full house, although one particular absence was one of a particular note. The instructor addressed the class from her desk to inform them of the absent student's reason.

"And so, due to family circumstances, Takamachi-san will be absent from school for a few days." The young-looking elementary schoolteacher informed her class, "But she's not out due to illness, injury or personal tragedy, so there's no need to worry."

That last segment of news drew some sighs of relief from the classmates. The girls of note were Suzuka and Alisa, Nanoha's best friends, who both were given a deep explanation from the aforementioned girl prior to her departure to the Asura.

'_I know there's not much we can do for her now.'_ Suzuka thought to herself, _'But at least it's nice to know that she trusts us enough to keep us informed. I wonder how Alisa-chan feels about this though.'_

'_At least she told us about this before she left.' _Alisa neutrally just stared at the teacher and the chalkboard behind her in an absent manner, _'I've been too hard on her recently'_

"While Takamachi-san is absent.." the teacher began to slowly list out some tasks that she would like one volunteer from the class to do, "I'd like to have someone take notes, collect handouts.."

"Hai!" Alisa might've broken a speed record or two in standing up from her seat and raising her right hand. She didn't give the teacher any chance to finish what she was going to ask, but it wasn't needed as just about everyone knew what it was, "I'll do it"

"Very well, Alisa-san" the woman accepted the offer easily, "I'll leave it up to you"

"Hai!" Alisa lowered her right hand and seated herself.

"Now, let's start today's homeroom!" The teacher declared, which started off the usual routines that occurred during homeroom in a Japanese elementary school.

'_Wherever Nanoha-chan is…'_ Suzuka thought as she found herself staring in the direction of the window and the clear sky, _'I hope she's still smiling and cheerful.'_

'_These Time-Space whatever people better make sure they return Nanoha-chan to us safely'_ Alisa thought to herself with little doubt of a serious expression on her face, _'Otherwise, they'll answer to me!'_

* * *

><p><strong>[Undisclosed Location: Inside a barrier]<br>[Local Time: Unknown*]**

**[VS: Jewel Seed Monster]  
>[BGM: "Normal Battle" Final Fantasy IV (Arrangement, DSIOS/Complete Collection)]**

It certainly didn't take long for the Bureau to isolate the presence of a recently activated Jewel Seed and it took even less time to get the trio of Yuuno, Nanoha and Sonic out there to take care of it. The trio was sent out there alone, but if they were to find themselves in a pinch, Chrono and Lindy would've been out there to get them out of it. For the moment it was a test.

The Jewel Seed must've possessed a bird; because this latest variant had taken a form of an avian sort. The possessed bird wasn't too big, but it had a wide wingspan and it could easily cover a lot of ground in an escape attempt. That observation from Yuuno made it clear that the main directive was to first get the bird busy enough for the boy to place it under binds.

To get the better results of a distraction, one must need the finest of live bait. In the current case, who better to be the distraction than the speedy Sonic the Hedgehog? The blue blur proved to be quite effective in snaring the possessed bird's attention while also using his speed to outmatch it to make sure that bird was going nowhere anytime soon. At the moment, the blue hedgehog, swords flashing and at work, rode the bird's back, making sure it's busy long enough for Yuuno to get a bind on it.

"Yeehaw!" The hedgehog shouted in practical glee. Live bait? No problem, he'll probably dress in drag and perform a hula dance if he felt it would've gotten a job done; a fact that only Nanoha was aware of, but she didn't plan on using it anytime soon. The blue hedgehog made two more slices at the bird's wings to weaken it further, "We're having chicken tonight! Dibs on the wings!"

"Good job, Sonic!" Yuuno, finding his human form far more comfortable for practicing magic, readied and unleashed his Chain Bind spell. Green chains of magical energy started to wrap around the possessed bird monster, starting with the wings. Luckily the hedgehog bait had jumped off the monster before the binding. The hedgehog landed just as the boy had finished his Chain Bind, "Alright, Nanoha! Your turn!"

"Okay!" the girl confirmed, bending her body down a bit to stretch. Unintentionally, her action had the effect of flashing Yuuno and Sonic her pink panties from under the skirt of her Barrier Jacket. This surprised the ferret-boy a bit and he couldn't help but stare. Sonic didn't take too much issue from it, although he did roll his eyes and bonk the resident ferret-boy on the back of the head with the hilt of one of his blades. The humorous exchange went unnoticed by Nanoha, who decided to start the sealing.

"_**Cannon Form"**_ Raising Heart chimed in declaration, _**"Set up!"**_

As soon as the device shifted forms to the combined shooting and sealing form, pink strips of Nanoha's magic started to wrap around the Jewel Seed possessed bird. When it was completely immobile, the serial number to the Seed appeared in the usual form of an inscription just underneath the bird's neck and beak. The inscription read the Roman Numerals VIII.

"Lyrical Magical! Jewel Seed Serial 8" Nanoha shouted out her magical incantation and command that she wanted her magic to do, "Seal!"

"_**Sealing commencing!"**_ Raising Heard declared as more pink strips engulfed the avian monster until it was completely covered. The monster appeared to squaw out in pain before it disappeared in a flash of light. There was no issue in sealing the Jewel Seed, so Nanoha was able to slowly coast down to the ground with the jewel beside her.

"_**Receipt No 8" **_Raising Heart declared as it safely stored the Jewel Seed inside, _**"Sealed!"**_

**[Boss cleared]  
>[Jingle: "Victory Fanfare" Final Fantasy IV (ArrangementDS/IOS/Complete Collection)]**

Sonic and Nanoha, as apparently practiced in habit, performed a little victory pose and dance combo that had a mixture of cuteness and coolness. The hedgehog took a small hop off of Nanoha's hands and took a backflip before landing again. As he landed, Sonic coordinated his usual victory pose with Nanoha's, which consisted of her twirling Raising Heart in her hands skillfully a bit before thrusting it straight out somewhere.

They finished their poses at the same time and held them. If there was anything these two were missing, it would've been some fanfare of sorts. But it wasn't like they were to let that stop them from doing these poses.

"Nipaaa~" Nanoha said cutely, really having nothing negative to say about these victory poses. Coordinating these poses gave her and Sonic a good opportunity to get to know each other's personalities better. Plus, she would've been a bit dishonest if she said that she didn't find them cute.

"Anybody else suddenly hungry for chicken?" the blue hedgehog asked because, of course, "Cause fighting that big bird has given me that craving."

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Lindy and the rest of the backyard staff had watched the battle from their vantage point in the situation room of the mighty cruise warship. They weren't just watching the battle from the footage, they were also keeping an eye on all of the sensors and such, making sure nothing went awry in the sealing.

"The situation has been dealt with successfully. The Jewel Seed was sealed with no issue" one uniformed tech informed the dispatched trio over live communications, "Good job, Nanoha-chan; Yuuno-kun, Sonic-kun!"

"Hai!" Nanoha acknowledged, looking up to the video screen above their heads.

"I'll make a gate for you three" The tech further went on to request, "Please wait there for a moment."

"Hmm.. those three are really quite excellent" Lindy commented out loud no doubt intentionally so that the trio on the sealing site could hear her praise, "At this rate I may want to keep them."

While the techs were busy setting up a dimension transfer gate for the trio to return home on; Amy Limietta was busy at her station with Chrono. The two were currently trying to find leads on the mysterious Fate Testarossa.

"So this girl in black.." Amy pulled up a screen that held a picture of Fate's face and side profile. The pictures weren't all that good as they were taken from device recordings, "Her name was Fate?"

"Fate Testarossa." Chrono confirmed; adding his own opinion to the surname of the mysterious girl as well, "Sharing a family name with a great mage"

"Oh…" Amy paused and turned her chair to face the enforcer, "Is that so?"

"It's a story from a long time ago" Chrono explained some of what he had read about in reference to the Testarossa woman in reference, "In the Central city of Mid-Childa; during an experiment, this great mage caused a dimensional interference, and was banished."

"And this may have something to do with her?" Amy asked, wondering how Fate fit into the picture

"Who knows?" the teen shrugged, "It might not even be her real name."

Amy went back to her typing so she could try to isolate the location of Fate. Despite her best efforts, however, she came up blank. There were no readings from Fate's device. Which, considering her suspected magic power ranking, was odd. Either there was interference or the girl was somehow able to conceal her own power so greatly that the Bureau couldn't find her.

"No good… I can't find her at all" Amy shook her head, and turned to face the enforcer again, "Fate-chan must be using a very effective jamming barrier or something."

"Her canine familiar…" Chrono gestured to a picture of Arf in her wolf form, "She's most likely the cause of that. She's probably supporter her master."

"Thanks to that, two of the Jewel Seeds that we've found have already been taken by them" the brunette noted

"Perform a thorough search to make up for the loss." The teen enforcer ordered of the cute tech bunny worker, "We're counting on you"

"Got it" Amy once again nodded and went back to her work.

**[Minutes later]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Fresh from their recent Jewel Seed sealing and the slight battle with the sickly feeling from the Dimension Transfer, Nanoha, Sonic and Yuuno talked amongst each other as they walked through one of the halls of the large ship. By coincidence they passed by an odd, but beautiful painting of a naked woman with long, black flowing hair and a long pinkish red ribbon wrapped around her body. No one noticed this, though if they did, it probably wasn't best to ask about it anyway and just admire the work.

"Fate-chan didn't show up" Nanoha paused in her trek and looked down; feeling slightly saddened that she didn't have a chance to meet with her rival.

"Yeah.." Yuuno stopped as well, though he was a bit more neutral about his feelings for their apparent rivals, "She seems to be out collecting Jewel Seeds."

"We'll meet them again" Sonic, in attempt to cheer up the brunette, patted her on the shoulder, "There's no reason not to. I've still got a score or two to settle with Ms Lassie"

The girl offered no words to what Sonic or Yuuno had said. She was still troubled. Despite that, she wasn't about to let her familiar's efforts go in vain however. The girl lightly gripped the hedgehog on his shoulder and pulled him close to her in a soft embrace. A chaste one at that, as the emotional bond between these two was more on a sibling basis.

* * *

><p><strong>[Undisclosed Location]<br>[No BGM]**

For Fate and Arf, their latest location lead turned out to be a big dud. The two had searched the better part of a stream of sorts that held some old, submerged ruins. The only positive thing about this little stop was the peaceful environment and mood that could take ahold of someone easily. These two were not so easily swayed however.

"Fate.." Arf, still in her wolf form, looked up to her master; whom was still clad in her usual Barrier Jacket, although for some reason her whole left arm was bandaged up; probably still from that other black-clad enforcer's spells. The wolf sighed and looked around the vicinity, not that it helped matters, "This area's no good. Looks like a dud"

"I see" Fate nodded neutrally

"We shouldn't be too surprised with these results" the wolf noted; not that she was complaining or anything, it was purely the truth, "We have the disadvantage of having to search in hiding. So that they won't be able to find us."

"Mmm.." the girl gave an agreement of a nod as she swiftly and almost in a dramatic fashion removed her bandages from her left arm with just a simple tug, "But we should do our best for just a little longer."

Sighing to herself, Arf watched as the recently removed bandage seem to just float in the wind. The wolf familiar couldn't help but have that lingering thought in her head that almost begged for them to run into their rivals again. The lingering thought's reason was due to her own initiative to save her master; and perhaps seeing a way to do so in her rivals; she just had to be sure and she wasn't. She never voiced said thoughts or feelings though, as she doubted her mistress felt the same.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[BGM: "Namae wo yonde" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Ten days have passed since Nanoha and Sonic have boarded the Asura and helped the Time-Space Administration. They've obtained three more Jewel Seeds, VIII, IX and XII. Not to be shutout, Fate and Arf have been confirmed to have obtained 2 more of their own, II and V.

For the moment, Nanoha, Yuuno and Sonic were in their sleeping quarters, looking at the three Jewel Seeds they had just recently obtained. Much like the living arrangement at home, Nanoha and Sonic had opted to share their bed while Yuuno had one separate of his own. The reasons behind the unusual sleeping arrangement were actually quite recent. Originally the kids all were to have their own separate beds. Lindy had originally intended it for a few common sense reasons and she wasn't fully aware of how the kids slept on earth.

Unfortunately, she was in for a surprise when the blue hedgehog had started to get nightmares on the first night of the arrangement. The nightmares actually surprised Nanoha a little too, but she was the only one who was able to keep them at a bay and had offered to share her bed with him again, and would take any responsibilities for any possible trouble it could've caused. Sonic, for his part, didn't mind, and wasn't about to decline anything, he just wanted to have a full night's sleep. The sleeping oddities aside, the trio found themselves in their sleeping quarters looking over the 3 Jewel Seeds that they had caught.

"6 left…" Yuuno noted the rather mathematically obvious situation. All but six Jewel Seeds have been identified and secured by either party.

"We're almost on the home stretch now if that's the case" Sonic noted with a sigh as he turned to face his, albeit by a few months, older sister figure, "How are you doing, Nanoha?"

"I'll be glad when this is over…" Nanoha answered briefly, though the hugging of her knees was a telltale sign as to how she truly felt at the moment, "Fate-chan hasn't been found yet, still.."

"Knowing our luck.." the hedgehog sighed, "We'll run into them again."

That wasn't the first and wouldn't be the last time that Sonic had said those words to his master. That line had come up oh about 3 times in the past week, but the optimism was still there.

* * *

><p><strong>[Situation room]<br>[No BGM]**

Despite the successful sealings of Jewel Seeds in the past 10 days, the last six were still unaccounted for. Lindy, Chrono and Amy all patiently sat at their chairs respective to their own position. For the most part, their search was isolated to the planet Earth and that was where the Jewel Seeds had landed. When the Jewel Seeds were inactive, their power barely registered on anyone's sensor; even with the advanced tech of the Time-Space Administration.

"The last six…" the woman thoughtfully pressed her gloved hand to her chin, "We still haven't detected any of them yet."

"We just expanded our search area to cover more than just the land. Since we are near a large ocean, it's quite possible that they've sunk into it" Chrono noted from his position, "Amy is also working hard to locate them and the girl in black."

"I see…" Lindy acknowledged the report. The woman let out a small sigh before standing up in her chair and stretched as if to indicate that she was about to leave the room, "Keep at it, let me know if anything shows up."

"Where are you going?" Chrono asked in some curiosity.

"While we have the time, I'm going to have a word with Nanoha-san and Sonic-san" the woman explained briefly as she started to walk out of the room, "There are a few things I've been meaning to ask them since they arrived here"

"Alright then" the boy was somewhat curious as to what his mother was thinking, but decided not to press the issue, "I'll inform you of any updates."

* * *

><p><strong>[Mess hallCafeteria]  
>[No BGM<strong>

The end of another fruitless search for the Jewel Seeds did a number on Nanoha's spirits, but she was still optimistic. She, Yuuno and Sonic discussed a little bit about their empty handed search results. Well she and Yuuno talked, Sonic was a little bit too busy enjoying the snacks.

"We came up empty handed again today" the girl sighed a bit

"It may take a while before we get them all." Yuuno noted before his demeanor changed to an apologetic one, "Nanoha, I'm sorry."

"Huh?" Nanoha paused a moment from a snack of her own. Heck even Sonic did so as well, the ferret boy's statement came out of left field.

"Aren't you lonely?" came the boy's question. Well-intentioned and for good reason; he probably felt that Nanoha might have felt lonely being away from her friends and family.

"Not really. I'm not lonely here at all. I'm here with you, Yuuno-kun, and.." the girl took a bite from her cookie then wrapped her arm around Sonic, who just happened to be sitting next to her, and pulled him into a little cute one-armed hug, "Sonic-kun's here too."

"Wha- hey hey hey!" Sonic flailed somewhat cutely, though there was no way he's going anywhere anytime soon, "my cookies.."

"I'm more or less okay with being by myself as well." The girl was not too shy to admit to her faults and reasoning, easily opening her heart to those who would listen, "When I was little, I was all alone a lot of the time..

**[BGM Insert: "Yasuragi" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

"Back when I was really little, my dad got into an accident at work and he couldn't move out of bed." The girl went on to explain a bit about her father's "accident" that happened when she was a little kid. If she had known then what she had knew now or at least suspected; she would've had the feeling that it wasn't her father's first accident, but it probably would've been his last in his previous job.

"He was just opening up the café, so it wasn't as popular as it was now. Because of that, kaa-san and Onii-chan were always busy." She had such vivid memories of her past and could never forget how she felt at the time, "Onee-chan was always taking care of tou-san. So until recently, I was all alone at the house a lot of the time.

"Even now I still think about how I felt back then. Everyone else had something they could do, but me. And I felt useless; with my small hands; I felt that if I could finally find something that I could do, I wouldn't feel so sad or useless." The girl finished on, "That's why I'm kind of used to being alone."

"That's why you jumped at the chance to save my life.." Sonic noted in reflection as the information and wheels clicked in his head, "Even if it meant binding our lives or something and getting involved in this, even despite the dangers."

"If you put it that way" the girl didn't deny it, "I know that this feeling would make me selfish, but if I saved you and helped Yuuno-kun with the Jewel Seeds, I would finally have something that I could do; something to get rid of that useless feeling."

"I see…" Yuuno absorbed the information from the brief but revealing exchange. The boy's thoughts went from the girl to the hedgehog, remembering some of the similarities between the two. He couldn't help but wonder if that was why Raising Heart bonded with them both so quickly, that they were of the proper nature.

"Come to think of it" Nanoha suddenly decided to change the subject, because, well of course, "I don't know much about your family, Yuuno-kun"

"Yeah.." The boy blinked a bit, surprised by the quick change and was about to talk about himself a bit and the similarities he had with the brunette. However he never had the chance as either by poor timing or design, Lindy's voice interrupted the chat.

"Will Nanoha-san and Sonic-san please come to my office please?" the woman requested, "I'd like to have a word with you both."

"eh?" Nanoha blinked rapidly and stood up, completely taken by surprise

"Now that came from left field." The hedgehog noted as he rose from his chair as well, "Rain check?"

"Sure.." Yuuno nodded and watched as the two went off toward the hallways, their course dead set for the admiral's office. The boy couldn't help but wonder why the admiral wished to speak with just the two of them, they couldn't be in trouble, could they?

* * *

><p><strong>[Office of Admiral Lindy Harlaown]<br>[No BGM]**

For Sonic and Nanoha, they were quite surprised to find that their summoning to Lindy's office wasn't for reasons of a scolding or anything. The woman had politely invited them to sit down on her little tea mat set and offered them sweets and refreshments. There was little doubt that the woman had wanted to ask the two a few things; she just took a different approach. The idea of the approach was to give the children the "mother figure they could trust" aura.

"Thank you for coming" Lindy kindly smiled to them; easily giving off that motherly, kind vibe, "I hope my summoning wasn't too much of an inconvenience"

"Not at all." Nanoha quickly answered. She was nervous somewhat, but her nerves were noticeably fading, "We were about to ask Yuuno-kun about his family after I told him a little about me."

"I promise I won't take too much of your time" the woman said as she poured some tea into separate cups for the young children, "There are just a few things that I'd like to ask you."

"They wouldn't happen to have anything to do with how we're sleeping, would it?" Sonic asked; having a legitimate cause for such

"I'll admit that is unusual and I am curious, but it's something I feel that will be answered as we go" Lindy shook her head, levelling a stern look at the hedgehog, "After all, kids of your age usually don't' get nightmares unless they witnessed something so terrible that it would cause haunting memories."

"H-hai.." Sonic flinched from the look and found his gloved hand gripping the sleeve of Nanoha's shirt, "I don't suppose scary movies count?"

"At your age, yes, but I know that's not the reason" Lindy noted, "You're not like the usual familiars. Most are created under contracts and take on a human form. You do not appear to have that."

"That would probably be because I didn't give him one" Nanoha admitted guiltily, "When I made him my familiar, I didn't want to change his form and make him feel uncomfortable"

"That's actually his natural form?" the woman, despite her experience, couldn't help her skeptical feelings about the matter.

"Yup" Sonic answered without missing a beat; anybody else he'd probably make a sarcastic joke, but Lindy was one of the few that could unnerve the boy, so he decided not to push it.

"Why would he not be comfortable with a human form? He doesn't sound or act any older than you" the woman, playing with a little bit of house money, pressed her curiosity, "And I'd like him to answer this one."

"I'm not exactly a fan of humans." Sonic quickly admitted and glanced to the other two to see how they reacted. For the most part, Nanoha had a little frown but she knew why and knew that he was improving. Lindy allowed herself to look surprised slightly for a brief moment before calmly taking a sip from her cup.

"Understandable; if you aren't fond of us, then you shouldn't be forced to take our form." The woman made no attempt to criticize the blue hedgehog, "Though, this does raise the question as to why."

"On our world, he's from a chain of islands known as South Island" Nanoha noted quickly, "I don't know if you've heard of the islands."

"Yuuno-san mentioned it to me recently" Lindy nodded in confirmation, "Apparently from what he could gather. South Island was recently under attack by a scientist identified as Eggman; and Sonic-san was apparently there. He didn't appear to know the reasons, perhaps our hedgehog could elaborate?"

"Alright…I'm not going to be able to keep this under wraps for much longer" The blue hedgehog let out a defeated sigh, "The reports that the Tutorial Ferret probably told you also said that Eggman's base was destroyed"

"Hai, I read that in the paper" Nanoha chimed in this time, knowing full well what Sonic was about to say next, but she wasn't so confident that Lindy was as informed, "It said that the Doctor's base was destroyed quickly and suddenly, and no one knows how"

"Well, that was me." Sonic said without missing a beat, his expression serious, "I was the one hedgehog wrecking crew that put Eggman out of commission."

"Just you?" Lindy couldn't contain her surprise the second time and just stared at the blue boy in disbelief, "You against what could be the equivalent of an army?"

"Never said I had it easy. I still remember the first day.." The hedgehog went on to explain, in such a detailed way, just how he single-handedly bested Eggman and his mechanic menace. Travelling through such beautiful zones, but having to battle all of his friends as they were turned into robots; it was tough. Sonic felt some tears in his eyes as he admitted to that, "And I still remember everything today. The smell of smog, the ash in the air, the feeling of cold steel on my quills, pungent odors, although that last one could've been Eggman's breath. It's hard to forget.. and especially the bad breath! I swear does that old geezer know of these things called breath mints?"

The ladies couldn't help but give the hedgehog a little chuckle for his efforts of a joke, but they both knew that he was almost close to breaking down. For such an almost traumatic experience to happen to Sonic; it was appalling. Nanoha was the closest to her familiar and she couldn't help but notice the tears threatening to fall from his face.

Before she could let the blue hedgehog burst into tears and interrupt the story, Nanoha pulled her familiar into a little cuddle. She calmed his nerves somewhat with the kind embrace and the cute little pats on the head. Lindy thought of the display as cute, and had she not pegged them for siblings, she almost would've had a lingering thought that they were a couple. She knew better and kept listening.

"It's been a while since then; but it's hard to forget and I can't help but wonder what would've happened if I had failed.." Sonic admitted with a sigh, "I wanted to take my mind off of everything, so I decided to take a vacation. I wanted to think that most humans weren't like Eggman; but I couldn't be sure. At least not until I met Nanoha"

"It was against the first Jewel Seed." Nanoha noted just to be specific, "He almost died too… and was about ready to give up on everything too until I… um…"

"Slapped me in the face and made me her familiar" the hedgehog finished with a cute grin, lighting the poor girl's cheeks pink in embarrassment, "Wicked left palm"

"And that was the start of your friendship?" Lindy drew the conclusion; she couldn't help but see the irony in it. Nanoha was probably one of the nicest girls she'd seen; and the girl would've gone so far as to slap someone if it got her message through.

"And since then my family's taken him in and he's like a brother to me" Nanoha eased up and actually sent a little teasing smile to him, "My younger brother."

"By maybe two months!" The blue hedgehog countered in exasperation, "Do you have to get that technical?"

"I'm impressed by you both even more now." Lindy interrupted their little exchange with a serene expression on her face, "Though one of you may not act like it, I can tell that you both have an air of maturity."

"Eh what?" Sonic stared at the woman in confusion, "Mature? Us?"

"I don't know how many other nine year olds who would've done what you did" the woman explained her reasoning, "Some others would've put their metaphorical tails between their legs and got out of dodge; yet here you two are, willing to take on the dangers."

"My reasons are a bit selfish though" Nanoha noted, "I didn't want to feel so useless like I did when I was young and alone.."

"Your intentions are still pure and you're still a nice girl besides that" Lindy smiled, "You two are such good kids; and I hope after this is over we'll all be able to get to know each other better."

"Hai.." Nanoha smiled in agreement, "Yuuno-kun too"

**[BGM Insert: "Raikou Shuurai" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Much like most picturesque and cute moments, this one never lasted long either. Within a matter of seconds, the whole office quarters had loud alarms sounding out throughout. Were it not for the fact that the room was so large, the three inside might've gone deaf or close.

"Emergency!" a male tech's voice sounded out through the speakers, "A large magical reaction has just been detected"

"Aw.. it never fails" Sonic quipped in some sarcasm, "Get a picturesque moment and trouble starts brewing."

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Somewhere above the ocean]  
>[BGM: "Raikou Shuurai" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Fate and Arf must've caught the memo about the possibility that the Jewel Seeds were sunk underwater and they didn't let the detail go by the wayside. The two were up high above the coast of Japan. Either it was in desperation or a lack of patience, or probably both, but Fate was starting to prepare a high-powered spell. Arf patiently watched as her mistress readied a spell to hopefully force a Jewel Seed's activation.

"Alcus Curtas Agias..." Fate began to chant as she floated in mid-air high above a large magic circle of her mana color, yellow. As she chanted, lightning started to stir up from her own power, "Swift glimmering thunder, fall under my guidance now. Paruer Zaruer Brouzel…"

'_The Jewel Seeds are probably under the ocean. So your plan is to pour a stream of lightning-based magic into the ocean and force an activation to determine the exact location,'_ Arf broke down Fate's plan in her mind, she didn't approve of it that much, _'This isn't something she hasn't done before… but Fate…'_

"To pound is lightning, to echo is thunder. Alcus Curtas Agias…" Fate chanted as what appeared to be a large yellow eye appeared over her head, glowing yellow in her magic color. The one eye soon multiplied into 8 and became linked by magical lightning flowing in between them all. With a loud shout, Fate unleashed her powerful spell Thunder Fall spell and shot the lightning into the water.

The magical lighting had created a huge chain reaction with the water. The waters swelled up in the magical storm. Thank goodness nobody was out there on boats or anything because the waters were dangerous. Far more than just some radical waves for those who spoke surfer lingo.

From within the yellow magic circle came one stream of light-blue power. Then another, and another; it appeared that the magic spell did the trick in activating the Jewel Seeds. There was little doubt that Fate was going to be successful, the question would be how many Seeds would be activated in her spell. Three more streams came up suddenly, signifying the activation of the last 6 Jewel Seeds.

"Found them…." Fate said weakly, her magic reserves had taken a huge hit from that activation spell and she was gasping to catch her breath, "The last six.."

'_Pouring this much magic and intending to seal all of them at once?!'_ Arf 's concern for her mistress far outweighed the amazement she might've felt at the display of pure power Fate had shown in her spell, _'Even with Fate's magic power and reserves, we're going to be well past her limit!'_

"Arf!" Fate backed up a bit in her flight and called to her familiar, "Please set up a spatial barrier and back me up."

"Sure, leave it to me!" Arf confirmed the order and slowly began to focus her own power, _'So no matter who comes, no matter what happens, I'll protect Fate!'_

The magic-induced chain reaction continued to storm about. Though they were both caught up in the magic storm, they all managed to hold their own in flight. It was tough, but not impossible. Arf went to work with a barrier spell. She was determined to protect Fate, probably more determined than Fate was to capture the Jewel Seeds.

"Let's go, Bardiche." Fate said to her ax-form device, "We'll do our best."

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space (Earth Orbit)]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

It took a dead sprint for Nanoha, Sonic and Lindy to get into the situation room, but they had all arrived there just in time to watch the fireworks. The display screen in the situation room had shown a shaky, but live feed of Fate's forced activation of the remaining 6 Jewel Seeds. The tactics utilized by the black-clad mage drew frowns and disapproving expressions from the Bureau members.

"What does she think she's doing?" Lindy was appalled by the actions and she couldn't help but stare, "It's so unreasonable it's disgusting."

"Not to mention reckless; she'll get herself killed by doing that" Chrono added as the feed showed Fate battled with the storm and the Jewel Seeds, "It's beyond the limits of how much magic power one can emit.."

"Ano.." Nanoha couldn't take any more of watching Fate almost get herself killed in that storm. She just had to help the girl, she had to; both she and Sonic looked about ready to head out there "I'll head out to the site immediately!"

"That won't be necessary." Chrono levelled a stern look on both the girl and her familiar, "Leave her alone, she'll ruin herself out in that storm."

**[BGM Insert: "Yogizashi" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Nanoha paused and her familiar followed suit. Nanoha just couldn't believe what she had just heard. Sonic had a better clue, but he wasn't about to lose his temper over a misheard quote or something of the like.

"Even if she doesn't ruin herself in the storm" Chrono went on with his cold demeanor, "We can smite her easily when all of her power has been spent."

"No wa-!" the hedgehog started but Nanoha quickly gripped his mouth to silence him

"B-but!" Nanoha found herself fighting two dangerous battles. The first was pleading with the teen enforcer while the second battle was keeping her familiar from losing his temper.

"We should prepare to capture her now" Chrono started issuing orders to the staff.

"Hai!" the tech and officer personnel affirmed the orders

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Site of the 6 Jewel Seeds activation]  
>[BGM: "Yogizashi" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Talk about losing battles, Fate and Arf seemed to be right in the middle of their own as they both found themselves battling the massive storm and magic chain reaction of their own doing. The blonde had Bardiche's Arc Saber activated, but it soon shorted out as she was dangerously low on her magic reserves.

"No good.." Fate was grasping for breath metaphorically as her exhaustion started to really slow her down. The girl soon found herself thrown about in the storm again as she futilely tried to fight, "ugh.."

"FATE!" Arf shouted as she tried to get to her master and support her but the storm just wouldn't let her. The wolf was soon zapped and thrown back, "Aaaack!"

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space (Earth Orbit)]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[BGM: "Yogizashi" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Nanoha found herself staring at the view screen again, watching helplessly as Fate and Arf continued to struggle against the Perfect Storm that was of their making. Sonic had cooled his temper down, albeit reduced to grumblings, but at least Nanoha didn't have to worry about him going after. Lindy, remarkably so, kept her calm and was willing to share her own experience in the matter.

"We must always make the best choice for the situation." The woman said calmly but still with a serious demeanor. She didn't like what it had to come to, but she kept her personal feelings from interfering with her duties, "Even if it may seem cruel to you both, that's the reality of the situation. If you two went out there now, there's a good possibility that you could get hurt and you have family and friends waiting for you at home"

That last point was the proverbial exclamation point. If Nanoha and Sonic were to get themselves killed as a result from going out there; they would've burdened Lindy among others with that painful and regretful house call at the Takamachi residence. For Sonic, Nanoha's life was especially important to protect because if she dies, he'll die as well.

Despite that, the two still were not willing to just stand pat and watch Fate and Arf put their lives in jeopardy. Not while they were both able to do something about it. With Raising Heart, their magic power and reserves at full strength; they were able to do something. Yuuno, who had opted to stand close to the entrance, was able to easily read that determination.

"_Go!"_ the boy said to them suddenly in mindspeak. The two blinked and turned to face the young archeologist. Yuuno offered them a friendly smile, _"Go on and help. I'll open a gate for you two."_

"_But, Yuuno-kun"_ Nanoha tried to argue with the boy; arguing that he shouldn't have to get in trouble just to help them _"The fact that I wish to talk to Fate has nothing to do with you!"_

"_She's right"_ Sonic added, _"This is our battle; don't put your own tail on the line just to help us out."_

"_That may be true"_ The boy noted, but still with that determined grin on his face, _"But you've both been a big help for me since we first met, and now it's time that I start returning the favor. You both were there to help me when I needed it the most, now I can start being a help to you two when you're in trouble. That's what friends are for, am I right?"_

Before anyone could do anything to stop him, Yuuno opened the dimensional gate that would lead down to the site. The boy had made up his mind; he was going to help out his friends. The boy stepped aside so the duo would have a clear path to the gate.

"You!" Chrono looked at the young boy in shock.

"Last one to the gate's a rotten egg!" Sonic grinned and revved up his feet into that trademark figure 8 motion that was his Super Peel-Out. At the last second before he launched off, he gripped Nanoha by the wrist, "On second thought; you get a free ride."

"Weeeee!" Nanoha pretty much resigned herself to enjoy the ride that her speedy familiar was giving her. After all she was only going to be missing that feeling of her feet on the ground for less than a minute if that.

Lindy and Chrono were taken by surprise at the sudden actions of the three; so much so that there was nothing that they could've done to stop them. Lindy gasped in surprise and her face had quickly lost any calmness that she had. A slight feeling of fear leaked to her face for a moment. Chrono was surprised, despite being unable to do anything, the enforcer settled for leveling a stern glare at Yuuno. Chrono's glare was countered with one of Yuuno's own as the boy spread his arms out protectively in front of the duo in the gate.

"I'm really sorry about this" Nanoha informed the crew in the room, her voice clear and full of determination, "Takamachi Nanoha is going to disobey orders and take action on her own!"

"You can count the one and only Sonic the Hedgehog in that too" Sonic added with a cocky pose and smirk, "Wherever she goes, I go."

"Transport to a location within that girl's barrier!" Yuuno made a few motions with his hands to make a magic command for the gate the two were in front of, "Transport for this girl and the boy with her."

Within seconds, magic light engulfed Sonic and Nanoha and they found themselves warped away into the gate. Their destination confirmed as anywhere within Fate and Arf's barrier. The two were off of the ship before anyone could react and stop them.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Site of the Jewel Seeds activation]  
>[BGM: "Unkai wo nukete" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

The Dimensional Transfer put Sonic and Nanoha high up into the skies just above the barrier that Fate and Arf were inside. The girl and hedgehog duo closed their eyes as they were in a freefall downward. Neither of them minded it really, in fact it was quite nice to have the wind blowing behind their backs. A cool breeze; if one was to put it in one way.

"Let's go, Raising Heart" Nanoha commanded to Raising Heart, the ever-so-trustworthy device attached to her neck, "As the winds fill the sky and the stars fill the heavens, so shall my heart fill with courage, and my hands with magic! Raising Heart, set up!"

"_**Alright!"**_ Raising Heart chimed as its master and familiar fell into the clouds, _**"Standby ready!"**_

The transformation of the duo created a bright flash of light that could be seen through a dark cloud above Fate's head. Both the blonde and her familiar turned their heads and paused in their efforts to see just who was behind this new intervention. She and Arf were greeted to the sight of Nanoha slowly descending from the clouds.

Arf was immediately taken by surprise at the new intruder's entrance. Fearing that the white-clad girl may try to get into Fate's way, the wolf broke free of the electrical binds that the storm magic had wrapped around her feet due to the influence of all 6 Jewel Seeds and rushed for her.

"Don't get in Fate's way!" the wolf shouted as she quickly covered the distance between herself and the rival mage in a matter of seconds. Before Arf could get any closer to the girl, a familiar blue spin-dash launched downward from the same clouds that the girl came down. The wolf familiar easily recognized her counterpart and had to stop when a sky-blue Round Shield spell appeared between herself and the hedgehog, "Y-you?!"

"Chill out, Lassie!" Sonic shouted at his wolf counterpart as he uncurled from his spin-dash, wielding his twin kodachi blades in a cross-armed defensive stance, "We're on your side right now!"

"This is absurd!" Chrono practically shouted in a direct communication link between the Asura and the scene via Raising Heart, "What the hell are you two doing?!"

"_I'm really sorry. We'll both apologize properly later for disobeying orders, but I can't just leave her alone!"_ Nanoha answered back quickly, surprising the teen enforcer with her resolve,_ "I'm sure that she's all on her own! It's lonely, being all on your own. I understand that."_

"If we don't stop the Jewel Seeds now; they'll only get worse." The blue hedgehog dispelled his shield spell, sheathed his twin kodachi, and then held out his gloved hands to begin focusing his magic power to cover Arf in his aura a little bit, "This should top you off."

"Why?" The wolf had only one word to ask of her counterpart as she found some of the injuries and pains from braving the storms, although most of them minimal at best, were healed by the hedgehog's magic.

"Do I really need a reason to help out someone who needs it?" the hedgehog countered that question with his own. Inside, he was almost jumping for joy, that was the first time he had successfully casted the Physical Heal; a spell that Yuuno had rushed to teach him. He couldn't help but grin a little when he saw the wolf stare at him in awe and surprise, "You look pretty cute with that thousand mile stare of yours"

"O-oy!" even through her wolf form, Arf still couldn't help but blush a bit at her counterpart's compliment. She had a feeling that he was doing so just to make her laugh, but she wasn't about to lower herself to fall for such a trick by someone lower on the food chan than she was.

"Gotcha!" the hedgehog smirked in cockiness; though it was quickly replaced by a serious demeanor that one almost would've thought impossible for Sonic. He quickly readied himself up to cast the Chain Bind spell he had again picked up in magic training; "At any rate, our girlies are going to need some help in sealing this whole mess, so back me up here!"

The hedgehog immediately went to work on his own to support Nanoha with Chain Binding spells. Although Sonic didn't have as much power to the bindings as say Arf or a certain Tutorial Ferret, he had quicker casting speeds so he made up for the lack of power with the speed and number of binds. The chains he made wrapped around one of the waterspouts from the storm and easily made short work of it.

With the coverage of her familiar working to take care of the waterspouts in her path, Nanoha was easily able to fly and navigate through the lightning storms over to Fate's location. She slowed down just as she saw the girl.

"Fate-chan!" Nanoha called out as she floated right beside her apparent rival, "We need to stop the Jewel Seeds!"

The white-clad mage held her device out close to Bardiche and the orb of the staff began to glow. Fate, exhausted and almost out of her reserves and probably was preparing for the worse, was completely shocked to see that her rival was actually starting to use the Divide Energy spell to share her mana. In no time, her reserves were replenished.

"_**Sir!"**_ Bardiche declared informatively to Fate as steam was finally released from its head and the Arc Saber regenerated, _**"Power has been charged!"**_

**[BGM Insert: "Uchinuite, yoru mo kurayami mo" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

"_**Divide Energy is complete Master"**_ Raising Heart added to Nanoha.

Fate was held speechless in her shock. It was an understandable feeling as well. She had been rather cold to the white-clad mage that she had continually considered a rival. Nothing she did could've earned the girl's help or support. Despite all of that, here was the white girl again, coming to her aid when she was in a bind; it just didn't make sense.

"We'll split it evenly into halves" Nanoha offered, "I'll take one half, and you take the other."

Meanwhile, containing the output of an extremely power chain reaction that were the six Jewel Seeds activated together at once proved to be quite the issue for just one little hedgehog. This was the only way he could think of that could calm the storms. He knew that his speed was certainly enough to stir up the wind a ton, but this wasn't a natural storm he was dealing with. Unfortunately magic storms call for magic solutions and the battle he was getting from the waterspouts was starting to bug him.

"Grah… and I thought navigating an underwater labyrinth on minimum air was tough!" Sonic grumbled as he found himself thrown back a little bit by a shockwave and tried to regain his focus on the binds. Fortunately he wasn't all alone as a Chain Bind spell of an orange magic color joined the fray and added to his own bindings. Looking to his right, Sonic had the pleasant surprise to find that Arf had lent her support, "Just in time, Arf"

"Later!" The wolf, for lack of a better term, barked at her counterpart. She had conflicting and confusing opinions, but she knew well enough that they could settle their rivalry later.

For the moment, the combined efforts of the familiars were keeping the magical storm at bay. The Chain Bind spell may have been one of the more basic of binding spells as most mages were able to learn it. But, in this case, the chains were able to lock onto the waterspouts from the magical storm. If pulled off right, their masters should have enough time to seal the Jewel Seeds.

"Sonic-kun and Arf are stopping the storm for us, so now's the only chance we'll get!" Nanoha said as she started to ascend up into the sky, "On my signal, let's seal all of the Jewel Seeds in one shot!"

"_**Cannon Mode!"**_ Raising Heard declared as it shifted into the combined shooting and sealing mode once again.

Unsure and confused, Fate glanced at Bardiche then at the white-clad mage she had called her rival. She once again found herself baffled by the girl's motives and actions. With Nanoha, she had found herself swerving back and forth to avoid the magical lightning. Luckily she was able to either avoid or lightly graze any lighting close to her.

'_When I was all alone, and feeling lonely, the one thing that I wanted people to do most wasn't to ask me if I was all right, or to be nice to me.'_ Nanoha thought to herself in reflection; her thoughts of optimism and determination fueling her resolve. The girl finally got high enough to place a large pink magic circle glyph suspended in mid-air. The purpose of the glyph was for her to have a solid footing in the air, and she would need it to concentrate her power. The brunette looked down at her black clad rival and locked eyes with her again.

"_**Glaive Form, set up."**_ Bardiche declared as it morphed its head to the spear-tipped hybrid Sealing and bombardment form much similar to Raising Heart's cannon form.

"Bardiche?" the blonde was surprised by her device's sudden shift. For the moment, she knew what she had to do. She locked eyes with her apparent rival and was greeted with a cute wink in return. Though Fate didn't notice, her cheeks flushed a light pink color.

"Divine Buster, full power" Nanoha declared as she held Raising Heart upward, "You can do it, right Raising Heart?"

"_**All right, my master"**_ the device confirmed as pink magical wings were generated just underneath the head of the device.

With a flick of her wrist, Nanoha focused her magic power which caused the large glyph to expand. Not to be outdone, Fate had created a large magic glyph of her own and Bardiche sprouted two pairs of magical wings in an X-pattern. With the storms held at bay by their familiars, the mages gathered as much magical power as they could. To seal all six Jewel Seeds in one shot, it would take a tremendous amount of power. With their power combined, Nanoha and Fate had a good shot at sealing them.

"Set!" Nanoha shouted out the signal to coordinate and synchronize the combined sealing shot to her rival.

"Thunder…." Fate declared out loud as a small burst of magic shot down to bind all six of the Jewel Seeds for the first stage of her spell.

"Divine…" Nanoha shouted as she focused mana to form a ball at the tip of Raising Heart's cannon form. Her targets were set as the six Jewel Seeds in the water, bound by Fate's lightning.

"Rage!" Fate stabbed the center of her magic circle with Bardiche. In doing so, she unleashed the second stage of her spell. The Jewel Seeds, which were already bound by lightning, were hit further by the powerful resounding boom of thunder. By itself the damage wouldn't be enough to deactivate and seal the Jewel Seeds.

"Buster!" Nanoha unleashed her powerful bombardment spell, engulfing all six Jewel Seeds with her magic. Much like the original Divine Buster, the Full Power variation was more suited for wide-area aimed bombardment. Or for those who'd prefer the video game terminology, her spell was suited for Area-of-Effect damage.

The two spells combined and caused an even bigger chan reaction that easily overpowered all six of the Jewel Seeds in the ocean. While the combined impact of their spells did also create explosions and reactions in the water and environment; luckily they were nowhere near any civilization so the only damage to note was the crumbling of some of the rocks and cliffs nearby. Although there were some rather unnaturally high surf and swells to the ocean, the body of water was well big and deep enough for it to be downgraded to merely rough waters.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space (Earth Orbit)]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The sensors on the Asura reacted to the sudden change in the signal that came from the Jewel Seeds. One of the displays showed the active status of the Jewel Seeds detected. One by one, the blips that represented the Seeds turned green as if to signal their sealing.

"The sealing of all six Jewel Seeds has been confirmed!" Amy Limietta reported to the admiral and enforcer on deck.

"What an irresponsible action." Chrono commented, though his demeanor was one of exasperation, which was an improvement to the outrage he was in earlier.

"But still that was amazing.." Lindy couldn't keep her surprise from her face. She also felt relief that despite the reckless actions, both Nanoha and Sonic were relatively unharmed.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Sealing site near the ocean]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Despite the victorious feeling Sonic had, he elected not to perform any victory dances. At least not until the Jewel Seeds were secured in a device or two. Arf was almost next to him, watching Fate as she and Nanoha floated close to one another.

What used to be a major storm had calmed down to a gentle rain. Under the overcast sky with the sunlight shining through the clouds; all six Jewel Seeds floated up in between the two mages ready to be stored in any device, be it Bardiche or Raising Heart.

'_To share the same feelings… to split the loneliness, the sadness in half…I finally understand it now… What I want to share with her..'_ Nanoha came to that realization of her own feelings as she looked at Fate's face and their reflections in the Jewel Seeds. Suddenly, the brunette placed her right hand over her heart, a gesture that confused her rival-apparent further "I want to be friends with you."

That statement had Fate gasping in shock and surprise. Friends? That was what the girl wanted from her? The fact that Nanoha had said it with her sincerest feelings from the heart quashed any idea that she was just trying to play any deception games. As if she could've gotten an answer from him, Arf leveled a confused and questioning look in his direction, only to be given a shrug and grin in return.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space (Earth Orbit)]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Just when it seemed like everything was going to turn out for the better, something just has to happen to ruin it. That probably would've been the shared thoughts and feeling for the backyard staff on board the Asura as their alarms went haywire again.

"Dimensional interference!" Amy called out in shock, "A magical attack is heading for not only our ship, but the combat air zone as well. The attack is coming from another dimension! Impact incoming!"

In a matter of seconds a burst of magical lightning impacted the Asura. Luckily the armor absorbed the impact and all it really did was knock a few of the staff folks off of their seats. While Chrono had used his mother's chair to keep him from falling, he was taken by surprise when she stood up and stormed away from her chair with the all too familiar card device in hand.

"Captain?!" Chrono stood and watched as his mother stepped toward the dimensional gate.

"You're in charge, until I get back. This is something I need to see for myself" the woman explained her reasoning as she also grabbed Yuuno by the arm and pulled him into the gate with her, "I'm going to need your support on this as well."

"H-hai.." Poor Yuuno was completely blind sighted by the woman's actions and the best he could do was just tag along for the ride.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Combat Air Zone]  
>[BGM: "ugokidasu shukumei" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

The purple stream of magical lightning struck an area close to where the group and Jewel Seeds were. Nanoha was completely taken by surprise and was rightfully confused. Her familiar was also a bit confused, but he voiced it in the form of his annoyance and sassiness.

"Of course" Sonic grumbled as he gripped his swords and unsheathed them, holding them in the usual grip style, "Just when we have a nice, cute moment; something just has to come and ruin it!

"Kaa-san!" Fate immediately recognized the spell or rather who was behind it.

The lightning, almost like it was controlled, struck Fate hard. The poor blonde squealed in pain as she fought a losing battle to maintain consciousness. It didn't take long for her to lose it and fall down toward the ocean.

"Fate!" Nanoha called after the girl, only to be knocked away with a graze of the lightning that came from when she was close to the blonde. She was blown away, but luckily Sonic was able to grab her before her momentum could take her into the drink.

Arf immediately shifted to her wolf-woman form and caught her master just before splashdown. After securing the blonde in a bridal carry; the familiar flew up to the Jewel Seeds, hoping that she could secure them. Unfortunately, she found her path blocked by the bluish-silver spearhead device Lindy Harlaown.

"Don't get in our way!" Arf shouted as she pushed the tip of the device away and sent a point-blank spell into the tall woman's gut.

Lindy had only taken minimal damage from the spell itself; however that still didn't change the fact that she was on a crash course to land in the rough ocean. Thankfully her fall was broken by a well-timed floater field spell, courtesy of Yuuno Scrya, who was there specifically to back up Lindy defensively should she need it.

Arf could care less about if the woman was helped or not, her main concern was securing the Jewel Seeds. She looked up at there the six originally were and gasped in surprise when she found the number of seeds was cut in half.

"There's only three?!" Arf, almost franticly with her unconscious master in her grasp, grabbed the three that she could grab and looked around in search for the other three. She finally found them, but not in favorable hands.

Lindy, with that stern expression on her face that gave off the telltale sign of experience, held out her left hand. In between her fingers were three of the Jewel Seeds. With the wolf-woman only able to watch helplessly, Lindy willed the three seeds to be transferred from her hands to her staff. The device let out a bit of steam as it accepted the now inactive Jewel Seeds.

"_**Captured, boss!"**_ the device declared in a mechanical male voice

"Thank you, Durandal." The woman said to her device, softly, but with meaning behind her words.

Her temper finally unable to be contained, Arf roared as she flung a spell bullet down into the water. The impact created another waterspout, that, while it was minor, it had done an effective job in making a diversion to cover her escape.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space (Earth Orbit)]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[BGM: "Ugokidasu shukumei" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

It wasn't often that his mother would leave him in charge, but Chrono was well educated in the protocols. Not that he needed them for the moment; the right course of action was well obvious. Arf was about to escape with Fate and the inter-dimensional attack had proved to be an effective cover.

"Don't let them escape!" Chrono ordered out to the crew, "Capture them!"

"It's no good!" a uniformed officer replied, "The lightning strike has stopped half of our systems from working!"

**[No BGM]**

The wave of lightning had expired as soon as Fate and Arf left the world. An eerie silence fell among the crew on board the Asura for a moment as the gravity of the situation settled in. There was another party that was completely unaccounted for. The party was most likely linked to Fate and her motives in collecting the Jewel Seeds. The crew of the Asura wasn't worried about that for the moment; they were more concerned about the possibility of another attack.

"25 seconds until all functions are restored!" a uniformed tech officer informed Chrono, the enforcer who was in charge while his mother was in the field, "We won't be able to keep up with them!"

"Leave them then. Put up any anti-magic defenses until our power has been fully restored" Chrono ordered; knowing full well the uselessness of chasing the wild geese, "Prepare for another attack!"

"Hai, (Sir!)" the crew confirmed the orders and went to work

"Also.." the teen added in his orders, "Retrieve Nanoha, Sonic, Yuuno and Admiral Harlaown."

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Air Combat Zone]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The inter-dimensional lightning storm had disappeared, and the skies had returned to their original overcast state. It was almost as if the lightning hadn't happened, but that wasn't the case. No one was hurt from it all, but the gravity and understanding of the situation was somewhat clear and muddy.

Arf and Fate had escaped once again and had taken three of the six Jewel Seeds while Lindy was fortunate enough to seal the other three and not leave empty handed. Still, there were so many questions amongst everyone. The eerie and uncomfortable silence settled in for all. The rain, appropriately enough, was the only form of "noise" that one could hear. If one were to summarize the collective thoughts of Sonic, Nanoha, Yuuno and Lindy, they would get an almost simple question to ask.

What just happened?

**[To Be Continued]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]<strong>

**[End of Chapter 11]**

Author's notes: If anyone watched the anime or movies; you'd note that originally it was Chrono, not Lindy, who intervened well at the end. I changed it here to add a different twist, plus to confirm some lingering suspicions from those who noticed that familiarity with Lindy's device in a previous chapter. Well now, looks like the fits hit the shan; another new twist has added yet another surprise to the plot. At any rate there are a few things I'd like to note specifically before ya'lls get to reviewing. For one, Sonic's backstory as he explained it to Lindy and Nanoha; how did that one turn out, I tried hard to get it together. Then there are the original twists I'm adding, I'd like to see how they're looking because it's so hard to really critique your own work because you know what you're trying to portray while others may not and I hope I made it clear. R&R please, I'd like some opinions.


	12. Chapter 12

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter of Lyrical Familiar. Yup for those who haven't noticed, I'm bringing in some movie materials for this one. Plot twists and cliffhangers galore; this will be fun. Let's go

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Air Combat Zone]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The eerie, uncomfortable silence settled in for Nanoha, Sonic, Yuuno and Lindy. The only noise and feelings came from the downpour of rain that the ocean was sometimes subjected to during the spring time. No one said a word yet, and it was really hard to say anything at the moment and they let the depressing mode speak for itself.

What had just happened was really hard for anyone to fathom, not just for the event itself, but how quick it went. Within minutes what had appeared to be a peaceful resolution and sealing of the last Jewel Seeds had turned into hell. The Asura was attacked by magical lightning that came from another dimension. The lightning was apparently also aimed for Fate, as she was knocked out almost instantaneously by it; leaving Arf to escape with her. Not that the escape was hard, the lightning did provide cover.

For Nanoha and Sonic, they were especially affected and had their thoughts plagued by questions. Who was behind the attack on the Asura? Why were they after the Jewel Seeds, and why did they also go after Fate? Well, the latter thought was from Sonic. He was particularly miffed; if he heard right in Fate identifying the spell as her mothers, why would someone show disregard for her daughter's life so much so that she'd allow her to be struck by the spell?

Unfortunately, the time they had for thoughts was cut short in a sudden as Lindy Harlaown, after giving the scene another once-over, had sighed and turned to face the rest of the group. The trio of youths couldn't help but flinch a little bit under the stern gaze of the woman. She didn't look pleased and her body language showed in the folding of her arms under her chest.

"We're heading back now" the woman calmly, but firmly, informed the three, "There's nothing else for us here"

"Hai!" The trio saluted without missing a beat. And unfortunately for Nanoha and Sonic, as much as they may have wanted otherwise; they couldn't help but notice that the woman had levelled a serious look in their direction, the type of look that basically meant they were in trouble and there was nothing they could do to avoid it.

"As for you two, Nanoha-san and Sonic-san" The woman's expression was firm and serious, "You'll both receive a stern lecture from me about this."

No doubt about it this time; Nanoha and Sonic were in big trouble.

* * *

><p><strong>[Opening: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 12<br>Everyone's Separate Heart-felt Vows**

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

For the crew of the Asura; none could hide that shared feeling of sympathy they had when they saw their admiral immediately take the duo of local mage and familiar straight for the debriefing rooms after transferring. It was a feeling similar to being back in school; where a student made a scene so bad that the principal had to intervene. In the current case, the metaphorical Principal Harlaown wasted no time in escorting the duo to the conference room.

It was in this particular room, with the lights dimmed to add to the mood, where Nanoha and Sonic stood on one end of the table; their eyes closed and faces showing that defeated expression as they waited for the woman to seat herself on the opposite end. Both of them knew it was coming and they both know what they had done to deserve their lecture, so there was little reason to fight it.

For her part, Lindy couldn't help but sigh in some hindsight. She knew that she had to give the two kids her lecture, and she knew why, there was no question they had deserved it. She honestly would've preferred that she hadn't had to do this. Nevertheless, her duties required it and it had to be done, and she couldn't show mercy just because she liked them.

"Following all instructions and orders is a necessary rule in order to protect an organization, not just an individual." The woman went straight to the point; while her voice and tone may have that motherly vibe, that also added further hurt for the duo as they could almost picture Momoko Takamachi saying the same thing with quite the same effect, "Your reckless decisions and actions may have put not only you, but everyone else around you in danger as well.

"You understand that," Lindy paused in her speech briefly to add a little alternation to her tone to imply a question in there, "Ne?"

"Hai, (ma'am)…" The duo acknowledged without any pause; and no jokes from the blue hedgehog; that would've only poured oil into the metaphorical fire.

"Normally, this would be cause for me to punish you two severely" The woman began, noting the wince from the duo as if they were expecting her to do such. She couldn't help but let a small upward curve of her lips as she informed them to the contrary, "However, as a result of your actions, we have gained a little bit. So, for this one time, I'll let it pass."

Neither Sonic nor Nanoha could hide the relief they had felt to hear that they were not going to get reprimanded outside of the lecture. Their musings were halted by the woman continuing; she had paused to let them acknowledge her lecture, but she wasn't done.

"However; there will be no next time." The woman said sternly, leaving no room for argument, "Understood?"

"Hai (ma'am)" The two agreed with again no snappy commentary from the blue hedgehog.

"We're really sorry" Nanoha added on her own note.

"Now then… The problem is what happens from here?" The woman reclined backward in her seat a little and addressed her resident enforcer/son, "Chrono, any ideas on the cause of all of this?"

"Hai" the boy, who had nothing but sympathy for the two locals, but hid it well, confirmed and made his way toward the table, sending a request to the ship bunny assistant Amy along the way, "Amy, bring up the monitors"

**[BGM: "Golbez. Clad in Dark" Final Fantasy IV OST (Arrangement/DS/IOS)]**

"Hai hai~" the brunette teen chimed in reply and activated the display monitors in the middle of the table. The screen displayed the profile of an older woman with purple hair; a woman that was recognized by all except the locals and their resident archeologist.

"Ara…" Lindy started a bit, staring at the profile on screen as information started to appear about the woman in question, "Her..."

"Hai… a mage from Mid-Childa just like us, Precia Testarossa" Chrono confirmed as more information appeared, "Her specialty was development of energy for inter-dimensional travel. She was a grand mage, and yet was exiled for causing an accident through illegal research.

"The wavelength and signature of the magical attack just now matches the data we have on file." Chrono glanced at Nanoha a little bit, knowing that she fought the girl he was about to refer to, "And that girl, Fate, is probably her daughter."

"Back then, she did say "Kaa-san"..." Nanoha noted in memory, though momentarily flinching from it as she was a little bit close to the girl when she was struck.

"Parent and child..." Lindy noted, "Huh…"

"She didn't look like she was surprised." the girl went on further, "I almost thought she looked scared."

"I would be too if I was on the wrong end of some magical, lightning attack" Sonic couldn't help but quip, and then quickly elaborate further, "If I didn't know better, I'd say the attack was aimed at her as well."

"I hate to agree with you on, that Sonic-kun" Nanoha noted, staring at her feet for a moment, "But I think you're right… She was hit by too much of it to be an accident. But what kind of mother would want to hurt her own daughter?"

"I don't know..." Lindy folded her hands underneath her chin in thought. She needed more information, "Amy! Bring up more information on Lady Precia; find out what happened after her exile; everything from her family information and so on."

"Hai hai~! I'll look for them right away" The brunette chimed in acknowledgement. Seriously, give this girl a raise or something.

The display of Precia Testarossa was still on in the middle of the table. She had no idea what to think, much like her familiar did. All the two of them could do was just stare at the woman; they were confused with her apparent motives and actions, but couldn't judge yet.

"This is Fate-chan's kaa-san..." Nanoha noted quietly.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>["Garden of Time"]  
>[BGM: "Golbez, Clad in Dark" Final Fantasy IV OST (ArrangementDS/IOS)]**

The disturbingly all-too-familiar whipping noise could be heard throughout the lair of Precia Testarossa. For the most part, they weren't accompanied by the squeals of Fate, as she kept quiet and only whimpered as she endured the pain. Her mother was upset with her again and had taken it out in the form of usual whippings. The only difference in this punishment was the longer pauses between strikes, although they were for the woman to catch her breath. Precia appeared tired, no real surprise considering the effort she put out earlier. Regardless, that didn't change the fact that she was upset with the girl.

"You had a big chance in front of you" The woman breathed out, "And all you did was stand by in a daze"

"I'm sorry..." Fate could only admit as she hung there, hung by her arms in chains. She had made her mother upset with her again; and this was her punishment. Her body would scream at her with every blow inflicted, but she had to endure it.

"How horrible, Fate…" Precia, slowly and slightly, closed the gap between herself and her daughter. The all-too-familiar whip was in hand and ready for another wave of punishment, "Do you really mean to make your kaa-san that sad?"

More lashings, more squeals; Fate had to endure it all. As she endured it, she couldn't help but recall the words that her white-clad rival had said to her. Friends, could that really happen? Why would her rival want to be a friend? That thought confused her, but she never voiced those thoughts in front of her mother. She just endured the lashings like it was the only thing she could've done.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration Inter-Dimensional Cruise Patrol Warship "Asura"]  
>[BGM: "Yogizashi" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

It didn't take long for Amy to gather the data she could get available to her. So much so that no one had to leave the room while she did so. Arguably, it took her more time to get the information organized to present than it did to attain it. It didn't take her long for that either.

"Precia Testarossa" Amy Limietta began her debriefing as she paced her steps in the meeting room, "According to Mid history, she was the head of Sector 3 of the Central Technology Development Office 26 years ago. However, at the time, she was developing a dimensional travel energy motor called the Hudra, where she conducted an experiment using illegal materials, and failed.

"Because it resulted in a mid-size dimensional tremor, she was forced to leave Central, and was relocated to a rural branch." The brunette teen continued as the information she presented was also backed up with recorded footage of a disturbance so devastating even the ground had a negative reaction, "After being relocated to the outskirts, she was involved in tech research for several years. After a while though, she went missing… nothing since then."

"What about her family?" Lindy asked, hoping to bring more pieces from the metaphorical puzzle together, "And her activities when she went missing?"

"All of the data regarding that has been completely erased" Amy informed the admiral in a neutral tone, "We're contacting HQ as we speak to have the data looked over."

"How much time will it take?" the woman asked, ever-so-thoughtful about how she planned to deal with this new threat.

"I believe it will be in the next day or two" the brunette applied her own speculation

"Hmm… neither Lady Precia nor Fate-chan should be able to move around too much after the amount of power they exhibited. We'll use that time to strengthen the Asura's defenses" Lindy made her decision firm. With all of the data presented, the woman stood up from her chair to address the three kids at the opposite end of the table, "It will be best that you three rest for a while"

"Ah..." Nanoha readily was about to argue, "demo..."

"Especially you both, Nanoha-san, Sonic-san" Lindy cut off the girl before the argument could be presented, "It's not good for Nanoha-san to be absent from school for too long; and I don't know what Sonic-san does during the day with Nanoha-san's family, but it's best not to worry them"

"Usually I work at the café her family runs" Sonic noted, "But most of my free time is spent on a personal project."

"What kind of project?" Even the admiral had her moments of allowing her curiosity to get the better of her.

"Eh... just restoring a plane." The hedgehog shrugged, "The only thing I'm missing is the engine and I'm waiting to hear back from one of Nanoha-chan's friends."

"If you'd like, I could accompany some of our ship techs down there and see what we could do to help" the woman offered, her mind at work in determining ways to encourage these locals that she liked to help out more, "It won't take long for the staff to boost this Asura's defenses, and more often than not, they get bored."

"You don't have to do that..." Sonic tried to reason, "The plane's really, really old anyway and the parts are hard enough to find."

"At any rate; I probably should let you kids return home." the woman declared, "Its best that you two make appearances with your families and schoolmates just to let them know how you're doing."

"The only family Sonic-kun has right now is mine." Nanoha noted, "But, we probably should check in and tell them we're okay."

"They already know what we're doing out here anyway." The blue hedgehog noted, "We haven't been exactly keeping this a secret from day one."

"You told them?!" Chrono glared at the group, the blue rodent in particular for being so nonchalant, "You're not supposed tell anyone about this!"

"I'll take responsibility for that" Yuuno spoke up, trying to leave some of the pressure off his friends and allies, "They didn't know any better; but I did, and I was the one who told their friends and family."

"That's even wors-…"

"Chrono, that's enough" Lindy interrupted her son in his mini-tirade; the clearer heads prevail most of the time for a reason, "While you've made your point and our presence and magic should be kept in a low profile; could you blame them if it was out of necessity?"

"Hai..." the enforcer stopped himself. Mentally he couldn't help but be self-critical over his lack of control at a time when he needed it.

"Besides, we could use this to our advantage. There would've been a need to inform them anyways; we were just saved the trouble" Lindy noted; though she did send a stern look at the resident archeologist, "However, Yuuno-san; this doesn't excuse you from doing it, so I will have a word with you before I allow you to leave."

"Hai (ma'am)…" The boy nodded with a small sigh, knowing full well from the start that his unauthorized debriefing will come back to haunt him.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>["Garden of Time"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

All was done, another round of Fate's lashings have been dealt with. The poor girl was barely conscious and just laid on the floor. Precia had left the room to gaze and calculate the Jewel Seeds that were captured all together. One thing was for sure, what she had done couldn't be forgotten, especially in the view of a certain wolf familiar.

"Fate! Fate!" Arf's voice could've been heard echoing out through the lair as the wolf-woman sprinted to the throne room. The poor wolf was freaking out as she checked on the condition of her master; her voice softened as she embraced the girl, "Fate… Fate..."

There was a cocktail of emotions working their way through Arf's system to her mind. Concern, anger, sadness, frustration, more anger; it all worked through her. The familiar's anger overpowered all other emotions that she felt. The wolf-woman gritted her teeth in such anger as she glared ahead at the door from where Precia was. The line in the sand was drawn; Arf would not let that woman harm her precious Fate ever again!

Deep in the cavern of her lair, Precia, who was oblivious to the feelings of the wolf familiar, gazed at the 9 Jewel Seeds in front of her. Even if she wasn't oblivious to the feelings or sudden burst of killer intent from behind her, she honestly didn't care. All that mattered to her were the Jewel Seeds; collecting them all and using them for whatever purpose.

"Only 9 Jewel Seeds" The woman gazed at them, thinking out loud, "I can cause a dimensional disturbance with these, but I can't reach Al Hazard"

A coughing fit put a stall to her musings. The fit of coughs were almost deathly serious as some of her blood was coughed out in her fit. The coughs, at least for her, were a sign of ill omen. And it brought to her attention one thing that she was running out of.

'_Time…. I don't have much time left'_ the woman thought to herself as she grasped her mouth for almost dear life, _'Not for me, not for Alicia...'_

**[BGM: "Golbez, Clad in Black" Final Fantasy IV (Arrangement/DS/IOS version)]**

As the saying went, when it rains, it pours. The metaphorical pouring occurred when an explosion occurred at the entrance to the cavern. The impact created a dust cloud and, of course, it drew Precia's attention. The woman, for the most part, may have been caught a little bit off guard by the intrusion, but she gave barely a courtesy look in that direction.

At the other end of the dust appeared Arf who appeared calm for the most part. The wolf woman's calmness betrayed the tranquil fury in her heart as she walked down the steps close to the entrance. For her part, Precia didn't care; she had given the familiar a courtesy look, but merely turned her back, an action that for most would've been a grave mistake.

For Arf, she had endured watching the pain this woman had inflicted on Fate for far too long; and she had enough of it. The second she took that last step and touched down on the ground, Arf's temper flared. The wolf woman let out an angry growl and rushed rather recklessly toward the older woman. Sadly, her efforts were blocked by a purple barrier of the older woman's creation.

With a soft, subtle smirk through that purple lipstick, Precia watched as the pitiful familiar futilely tried to break her barrier. She honestly could've done so many things to the young wolf girl, but decided against it on a pure whim. It was only on that whim that Precia had dismissed the barrier and let the wolf have her say. The woman was greeted rather rudely by Arf gripping the collar of her dress.

"You're her mother, and that girl is your daughter, right?!" Arf shouted in anger and frustration at the woman; screw the part of clear minds prevailing, this wolf angry and could take no more, "She's trying her hardest for you! How the hell can you be so cruel to her?!"

It took only one look into that face of Precia's that caused Arf to relent for a moment. That look was one of pain, hurt and disappointment was obvious on the woman's face. It was Arf's moment of relent that proved to be a mistake. Precia took it and impacted the wolf girl with a powerful point blank spell that blasted the girl a fair distance away.

"She's terrible at making a good familiar." Precia said in disappointment as she slowly approached the offending familiar. In the woman's right palm was an orb of mana "Too many excessive emotions…"

"Fate… Your daughter wants you to smile so much… she wants you to be a kind person again, and does so much…" Arf grunted out as her back was against a gathering of rock. Her wounds from Precia's spell overtook her as she flinched in pain and perhaps future pain. The latter was apparently more of the case as the woman in front of her called forth her staff.

"You're in my way..." The woman declared coldly; however her face soon gave way to an almost sadistic smirk, "Be gone!"

Energy gathered at the tip of the staff as the woman appeared ready to fire off another spell, this one with probably a good amount of that deadly feeling. Arf, however, was not about to take her apparent death for granted just yet. With as much strength and power that she could muster despite her weakened condition, she activated a quick spell of her own just as Precia fired.

The resulting explosion created a gaping hole in the floor that was deep enough to go through the ground of the lair. Through the dust of that explosion flew an orange blur of magic and speed. Though she was injured, Arf was still able to pull off the last ditch teleportation spell.

'_It doesn't matter where I teleport!' _Arf weakly said in her thoughts; she just wanted to get out of there, _'I'm sorry, Fate! Please wait for me... just for a little while.'_

**[No BGM]**

Back up in the impact spot, Precia didn't even so much as give the scene a courtesy look before she turned away. The woman, slowly, but with intent, walked back to the throne room of her lair. Her unconscious daughter lied there, covered by the small cloak that used to belong to Arf. She didn't wait to wake the blonde as time was running short still.

"Fate…. "The woman called out to the girl, "Wake up, Fate."

"Hai..." the girl softly answered back. She was still weak from her latest punishment, but still answered the woman, "Okaa-san..."

"The number of Jewel Seeds you have brought me is nine." The woman said as she displayed all nine for the girl to see. Her tone didn't need to hide the disappointment she felt, "This isn't enough. I need at least five more. If possible, even more than that; hurry and retrieve them for your kaa-san."

"Hai…" Fate answered as she slowly managed to muster the strength to seat herself up. As she did so, she couldn't help but notice the familiarity of the cloak that was on her, "Arf?"

"Oh… that girl ran away" The woman blatantly lied; her purple lipstick coated lips having a slight upward curve to them, "She said she was scared, and had had enough.

"If you need one, I'll get you a better familiar." The woman knelt down to her daughter and made a dishonest offer; however the tone she carried still exuded honesty, "Don't forget that your one true ally is your kaa-san. Got it, Fate?"

"Hai…" Fate's own answer held half of her sincerity as well. Try as she might, she'll never be able to forget Arf. Part of her knew it, but it was deep down and her devotion to Precia overpowered such thought, "kaa-san..."

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari City, Japan]  
>[Residential District, Takamachi Residence]<br>[BGM: "Eeto desu ne" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

It was a little bit into the mid-afternoon when Nanoha and Sonic finally returned home with their tutorial ferret in tow. However, it came to a bigger surprise to the others of the family when there was another woman right behind the kids plus ferret. Regardless, they welcomed the teal-haired woman, figuring that she would be the one to provide a clear explanation.

Explanations were among one of the things that Lindy had on her agenda when she graced the Takamachi family with a visit. On that same agenda, Lindy was set to check out the biplane that Sonic had said was a personal project, and it didn't take long for a small group of techs to make their way to the backyard and scope out said old relic of a plane.

At the moment, however, her focus was debriefing the family of Nanoha and Sonic's activities. The advantage of said family knowing about magic made it rather easy. Easy in the sense that she didn't have to doctor the truth with a cover story. Make no mistake, she still had given Yuuno a stern lecture prior to coming out, which explained why the Tutorial Ferret was quiet.

"And that's how it's been for the past ten days" Lindy noted; let it not be said that she couldn't handle a casual environment. She was easily dressed for the social call in her brownish skirt, purple long-sleeved shirt and the light shawl-like fabric wrapped around her elbows. She was also easily able to talk about everything with the family as if it was the weather or something.

"_Lindy-san..."_ Nanoha was easily impressed further by the easy, friendly tone that the woman had carried in her explanations. Her familiar/little brother, Sonic, was also impressed but opted to let Nanoha do all of the talking, _"This isn't even a lie or a cover story."_

"_Sugoi..."_ Yuuno added

"_I may have the need to inform them of the whole truth" _Lindy added to the mindspeak conversation as she easily multi-tasked with small talk with Momoko Takamachi, _"However, that doesn't mean I'm going to make your family worry while I do so."_

"…. However, despite their faults, Nanoha-san and Sonic-san are excellent children" The kind, experienced admiral went on to give kind words for the aforementioned children. If one were to draw comparison, the woman sounded much like a schoolteacher serenading about her students, "I really would like my child to be more like them."

"Oh..." Momoko let herself be a bit embarrassed as she set her tea on the table, "I wouldn't go that far."

"Really." Lindy was most certainly not about to let a chance to embarrass her son while he was absent go to waste, "My Chrono-kun isn't good at being nice to others."

"Nanoha..." Miyuki turned to address her younger sister, "You're going to be able to stay here for a few days, right?"

"Hai" Nanoha confirmed such question

"Alisa-chan and Suzuka-chan have been worried about you two" Kyouya added, "Have you contacted them yet?"

"Hai." Nanoha nodded without missing a beat, "I sent them an email a while ago."

* * *

><p><strong>[En route to Bannings Residence]<br>[No BGM]**

Sure enough, Alisa had received the email from Nanoha informing her that she was home safely. It came to a hidden relief for the dirty-blonde, and, although she wouldn't be able to confirm it for herself, but she knew that Suzuka had also received the message from their mutual friend. At the moment, Alisa was being driven home from her lessons as the sun was setting.

"And send!" The girl chimed almost musically as she sent a message from her phone and flipped it shut.

"Alisa-Ojou-sama" the driver of her car, an older man with a full head of grayish hair and a matching moustache, "Did you receive good news?"

"Not really. Just an ordinary email." The Anglophone downplayed the importance of the message a bit and stared out the window of the backseat for the car. As she did so, she must've noticed something off of the road to the left, because it gave her a start, "Samejima, stop the car for a second!"

It took less than a second for the car to pull over to the left side of the road and come to a complete stop. Alisa was even quicker to get out of the car and make for the dirt road to the side. If anyone were to look in that direction, there would definitely be some cause for the girl's concern.

**[BGM: "Kizuna Shinjite" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Blood; a trail of blood led up the dirt road. Alisa wasted no time in following it with a dead-run sprint. She let out a soft gasp when the trail of blood ended to reveal a large wolf-like creature. The wolf was laying on her side and gasping for breath in pain of her obvious wounds. Despite knowing that she wasn't going to let this wolf succumb to injury, Alisa couldn't help but note the oddities.

"A dog?" the dirty-blonde noted her thoughts out loud, "A really big one at that, and that fur seems familiar."

The wolf, for her part, was far too tired and injured to respond to the voice. Even if she wasn't, she also wasn't in a position to recognize the voice anyway. All she could do was just lay there weakly.

"Alisa-ojou-sama!" the driver called out as he joined the heiress's side. It didn't take long for him to note the presence of the large wolf, "Its wounds appear to be severe"

"But it's still alive; and we can't just leave it here." Alisa said to her driver; "Samejima!"

"Understood" the man didn't need to be told of the full order as he knew what was needed. Slowly, the man started to kneel down toward the injured wolf, intending on carrying it to the car. As he did so, the wolf's left eye started to open as if to determine who this new presence was.

'_Fate…'_ was the weak wolf's only thought.

* * *

><p><strong>[Bannings Residence]<br>[BGM: "Kono hiroi sekai ni" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

Once Alisa had taken the wolf to her home, she placed her in a large cage to let her rest and recover. Barring a snack or two, not once did Alisa leave that wolf's side. Her reasons for doing so were multiple, but one outweighed all of the others.

Alisa would no doubt consider herself a dog girl. She cared deeply for the canine sort and would often rescue the injured dogs and take care of them until they found homes. It didn't matter the breed of dog either for that matter. In a way, she was similar to Suzuka, who would do the same thing for cats.

It was at this cage where Arf had awoken. She woke up amongst a feeling of total confusion. Not only was she in an unfamiliar environment, a lot of time had apparently passed while she had rested. It took her a while before she could gather any of her senses yet, but that didn't stop her from opening her eyes.

"Ah! You're awake!" the next sense was her hearing as she heard a young voice call to her. Upon looking toward the source of the voice, she found herself staring at a girl with dirty blonde hair. The girl was flanked by two big dogs to either side of her, with their expressions unreadable.

'_This girl…'_ Arf's primary focus was on the girl in the middle, trying to place the familiarity of the girl in memory, _'I've seen her before...'_

"You're built really tough. You were hurt really bad, but they said your life wasn't in danger." The girl, who upon a further look from Arf, was revealed to be carrying a bowl of food, opened the gate door and set the bowl at the wolf's feet, "I'll take care of you until your wounds are healed up."

Arf, rightfully feeling confused, sat up and stared at the girl further, trying to place her in memory. Her efforts were probably misunderstood as the dirty-blonde girl stroked her forehead softly.

"So rest easy." The girl said in a soft but kind tone and then it all came together for Arf. The girl was the one who stood up for Fate's apparent rivals at the onsen weeks ago.

'_She's their friend!' _The wolf stared in awe as she watched the girl close the gate, but make no attempt to go anywhere.

"Here." The girl pointed to the dog food at Arf's feet, "It's soft food, can you eat it?"

"Hai…" Arf answered softly as she took note of the food and nibble at it a bit. Taking the chance there, she gazed at the girl's face for a reaction. From her point of view, she had to give the blonde some credit, as she didn't appear to be too surprised like one normally would.

"So you can talk too" Alisa noted in some observation as she gave the wolf a curious glance. Trying to place the possible familiarity to the odd, abnormal wolf; she noted the odd, but familiar fur color, but the voice wasn't too familiar.

"We've met before" Arf noted softly, figuring she better break the ice and let the girl know just who she was giving hospitality to. Not that she was in a condition to do anything about it, but it was still something she felt necessary, "The last time, I was in a different form."

"Ara… eto…" Now Alisa was starting to figure it out. She could start to place the voice; alongside that there were several points that started to piece it all together. The biggest one was when the wolf noted to a different form. She let out a soft gasp in realization, "W-wait… weren't you at the onsen?!"

"That's right…" The wolf coughed a bit in between bites. A sign that she was probably trying to eat her food too fast, "ugh..."

"You're eating too fast. The food's not going anywhere" Alisa softly consoled the wolf. Despite knowing who she was; there was still no way she was going to just ignore her, "You should take your time and rest after you eat. We'll talk more when you get better.

"Although with that appetite of yours" The blonde grinned a bit in humor, "That certainly won't take long."

* * *

><p><strong>[The next day]<br>[Public Seishou Auxiliary Elementary School]  
>[Grade 3, Class 1]<br>[No BGM]**

For Nanoha, there were a multiple of reasons to be happy to be at school. The main reason for her happiness and excitement was the fact that she could see her best friends again. They, for the most part, were just as happy to see her, even if Suzuka displayed such feeling a little bit better than Alisa did.

"Nanoha-chan!" the purple-haired heiress had to show major restraint as she fought the urge to hug the heck out of her best friend in the classroom.

"It's good to see you, Suzuka-chan" Nanoha smiled happily and cheerfully. Her optimism evident as she gazed at Alisa, hoping that the girl wasn't mad with her, "You too Alisa-chan."

"Hmph!" Alisa put on a little bit of a show that furthered her status as a tsundere as she turned away and folded her arms; though she couldn't hide the slight upward curve of her lips in relief to see Nanoha again.

The three talked a little bit about what they could do after class. Most of it was dependent on Nanoha's freedom to stay for a few days. With that actually established, the girls went on to discuss where they were going to play.

"We could go to my place…." Alisa offered; her theatrical tsundere attitude toward Nanoha probably could've won an award or two, "I bought more games recently."

"Really?!" Nanoha sounded really excited to hear that, "If you don't mind, could we invite Sonic-kun too? I think we've converted him to video gaming"

"Ara... That's right!" oddly it took the mention of Sonic to remind Alisa of the talking orange dog she found last night, "Last night, I picked up a dog that was hurt on the way home."

"A dog?" Suzuka couldn't help but ask for some clarification

"Yeah. she was really big and had orange fur. And it had a red stone on her forehead." Alisa nodded to answer the girl, and more details came to her mind quickly, "Oh and she could talk too!"

'_Big, orange fur, talking... stone in forehead...' _Nanoha pictured the details in her mind and realized quickly with a start, "Oh! I think I know her."

* * *

><p><strong>[After School]<br>[Bannings Residence]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

It took the girls a little bit of time to get to Alisa's house because they had to wait for Sonic to show up at the school, but they still made great time. With the afternoon sun shining brightly behind them; the girls, plus Sonic and a certain Tutorial Ferret, stared into the cage. Sure enough, Alisa's description matched the memories of Sonic, Yuuno and Nanoha; this was Arf; no doubt about it.

"So, it is you..." Nanoha noted in addressing the caged wolf, "Arf-san"

"You..." the wolf, having to rely on her tone as her facial expressions wouldn't be so helpful in determining her true emotions, gave a weak nod.

"You've definitely seen better days, Lassie" Sonic noted in observation as his gaze was locked on the numerous amount of bandages covering the wolf's body, "What in the world happened to you?"

"And what about Fate-chan?" Nanoha added

Arf had said nothing and had turned her back on the girls with a soft sigh of regret. She wasn't willing to have her say in front of too many people. She must've unknowingly sent a message to her counterpart and rival Sonic; because the blue hedgehog gave a soft, understanding nod. Undeterred by the girls, Sonic approached the wolf's cage.

"Sonic-kun" Nanoha blinked in confusion.

"_Leave this to me"_ Sonic sent the girl in mindspeak. The wolf had been trying to talk to him for a while now, so he decided to give her that chance. His face gave way to a mischievous smirk as he gazed between Nanoha and Yuuno, "Oh! Nanoha-chan, don't tell me you forgot about our Tutorial Ferret's dishonesty in the onsen, did you?"

"Eh? The girl blinked for a moment if that, before she matched expressions with her familiar and gave the ferret a dangerous look, "That's right! I had almost forgotten. Thanks for reminding me!"

'_Oh crap!'_ Poor Yuuno had a look on his face akin to that of a deer between the headlights as he found Nanoha's grip on him tighten, if only for show purposes.

"Eh?" Alisa and Suzuka stared in confusion; evidently they didn't get the memo, but they were going to soon enough.

"There's something about Yuuno-kun that he hasn't told you two" Nanoha almost cheerfully chimed as she turned towards the large house, "Why don't we ask him about it.

"Okay..." the two nodded, figuring to just go along with it. Oh boy were they in for a surprise. At the same time, Yuuno-kun was in for some divine punishment.

Sonic gave the trio of girls plus ferret a minute to go inside before he figured that enough time has passed. At long last, the awaited talk that Arf had been lobbying him for the past few encounters. The blue hedgehog, once again, toned down his joking façade as he faced the wolf; whose back was still to him.

**[BGM: "Marble zone" Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis)**

"Alrighty, let's talk" Sonic broke the ice first, "What in the world happened to you? Did something happen with your girly?"

"The fact that you guys are here means that the Bureau is watching this conversation, right now" Arf answered, again keeping her back toward the hedgehog, her own conjecture being drawn from the presence of her rival, "Am I right?"

"Much as I hate nosy intruders" the blue hedgehog nodded with a grumble, "We've got some eavesdroppers."

"_This is Chrono Harlaown, Enforcer from the Time-Space Administration" _Chrono interjected in an active feed with the resident duo of familiars, _"It appears that the situation is complex. If you speak honestly and cooperate, I will make sure that your cooperation doesn't go against you. About you, and your master, Fate Testarossa."_

"I'll tell you everything." Arf had taken only a second or two to let out a sigh in defeat, "I'll agree to your terms and tell you everything. However I have a few conditions."

"_Conditions?"_ Chrono made no attempt to hide the bluntness in his tone, _"You're hardly in a position to make them- ugh!"_

"_Ignore Chrono-kun. He can be a meanie sometimes." _Amy Limietta, who had apparently jammed her elbow into the rude enforcer's guy, took over, _"This is Amy Limietta; I'm a cadet from the Bureau, but I handle the intelligence and research. Name your terms."_

"For one, I will only answer questions from the blue hedgehog boy; familiar to familiar." Arf made that point clear; she only wished to deal with the hedgehog's questions; she cared little for what Sonic had done with the information, "Lastly, I want you guys to promise that you'll do everything within your power to save Fate! She hasn't done anything wrong!"

"_Fair enough… ehm... we accept your terms"_ Chrono grumbled a bit, he certainly gained a new respect for the ship bunny/cadet's elbow after his gut took that blow, _"Amy... the recorder"_

"_One step ahead of you"_ The brunette chimed ever-so-joyfully. Chrono may be her superior, but she was two years older than him and there was no way she'd let the little brat's rudeness ruin any chances to gain intelligence.

"You can see why I don't have a dull moment with these guys" Sonic quipped cleverly to the wolf, his efforts earned him a nod as the wolf had turned to face him finally, "Alright, let's hear the sco-"

"YOU PERVERTED FERRET BOY!" Just as they were about to get started with Arf's story, they had a delay as Alisa's voice could've been heard from within the house...

"What the…" Arf blinked, looking in the direction of the house. A glance toward Sonic showed that the blue hedgehog had trouble keeping the straight face.

"Looks like they found out." Sonic grinned in humor, though he did had a little bit of sympathy for throwing the poor Tutorial Ferret into the metaphorical fire, "I wouldn't want to be a fly in that house right now."

"_Pardon me"_ Amy chimed, _"We're getting off topic here."_

"Alright alright… let a hedgehog have some fun." Sonic shrugged before leveling a serious glance at Arf. His arms were folded across his chest and his foot was tapping in his decreasing patience, "Let's have the scoop."

"H-hai" the wolf nodded quickly, a little bit unsure of what to think from the light atmosphere. Regardless, she still had to cooperate and inform the Bureau of her knowledge, "Fate's mother, Precia Testarossa, is the start of it all"

Arf spent the next few minutes explaining her story in as much detail that she could gather. She confirmed that Precia Testarossa was after the Jewel Seeds and she was using Fate to gather them. She made no attempt to hide the fact that Precia would often beat Fate with a whip if she did anything to disappoint her. Precia was depicted as cruel in Arf's mind; as no matter how much work and effort Fate put in, her mother still found any way to make fault from it. It drove the wolf to the point where she couldn't stand to watch Fate suffer anymore and lashed out at the woman. Sadly, it only brought her to her current condition.

Meanwhile, Yuuno was in a small dog kennel, which was what Alisa deemed to be the dog house for him. She placed the cage plus ferret on the couch that the TV and game system faced. The three girls were currently playing an RPG when Sonic dragged Nanoha to a mindspeak communication with the Asura.

"_Alrighty, Bureau folks got their detail"_ Sonic, for the most part, appeared calm throughout the whole story, which shocked Nanoha a little despite the hedgehog's improvement, _"You catch all of that. Nanoha?"_

"_Hai... I heard"_ Nanoha confirmed in reply, her head hung down low as she stared at her dress skirt and shoes. Her body language caught the attention of her friends, who had paused their game; but she had asked that they wait until the conversation was over before she could talk.

"_The conditions that you had described to us… along with the testimony of the girl's familiar, Arf as well as her current physical condition… There appear to be no lies or contradictions in her story." _Chrono noted on his side from the Asura, _"We have more than enough to arrest Precia Testarossa. Just the fact that she attacked the Asura is more than enough reason, but this puts all doubt to rest."_

"_What's gonna happen now?" _Sonic asked

"_Once we hear word from the admiral, we'll be forced to change our mission to arrest Precia" _Chrono informed; his attention solely on Nanoha and the blue hedgehog now, _"What will the two of you do? Nanoha Takamachi, Sonic the Hedgehog?"_

**[BGM: "Namae wo yonde" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

"_I…" _Nanoha's face gave way to a serious look as she stared up at the screen, giving Chrono that serious look of hers, _"I want to save Fate-chan. Arf-san's feelings, and my own will... Seeing a sad look on Fate-chan's face makes me sad as well. That's why I want to save her, from all of the sad things._

"_Because I told her that I wanted to be friends with her"_ Nanoha easily explained her feelings with what she told the blonde earlier, _"And I haven't heard her answer yet."_

"_I'm with her all of the way"_ Sonic noted in his agreement with Nanoha's feelings, _"I'm kinda like my counterpart here. I'll protect Nanoha-chan no matter what she's going to do"_

"_I understand" _Chrono said as he stepped forward to face the two on the screen, _"We're thankful to have your magic powers and skills on our side. We'll leave everything concerning Fate Testarossa up to you, Nanoha"_

"Well then… That should answer your questions and doubts" Sonic locked eyes with his counterpart behind the cage again, "What do you say to that?"

"I'll agree" Arf nodded, she tapped into the communication to reach Nanoha, _"Nanoha.. was it?_

"_I don't have the right to ask this of you, but please… save Fate!"_ the wolf pleaded with the girl, _"She's all alone right now.."_

"_It'll be all right. Leave it to me!"_ Nanoha nodded and closed the communications; rejoining her friends in conversation, "Sorry about that, guys"

"About time you rejoined us in the real world" Alisa playfully teased her brunette friend. Any feelings of contempt she held were gone for the moment in favor of taking on the next level in their video game.

As the trio of gamer chicks played the next level of their action game; Nanoha listened as Chrono listed out his plan to deal with Precia. They'd board the Asura tomorrow then go after the woman, wherever she was. The only issue that rose was the idea that Fate could appear prior to then; to which Nanoha was quick to assure that she'd be able to handle the girl.

Time could fly so fast sometimes when one's focused on a video game. The three girls found themselves enjoying iced tea and cookies for a snack as the setting sun basked the house in the orange-yellow glow.

"I really got into that one!" Alisa lamented about the latest video game they played. Taking a sip through the straw, the dirty-blonde girl let out a pleasured breath as she savored the ice tea.

"It's more fun when you're with us, Nanoha-chan" Suzuka added

"Arigatou.." Nanoha softly but bashfully thanked her friends for their compliments, "Everything will be over soon. I'm sure of it.. and I'm sorry if I worried you two."

"It's alright, Nanoha" Alisa said to the brunette; locking eyes as she gazed at her face, "We're your friends, so we're going to worry about you no matter what's going on."

"Alisa-chan.." the brunette blinked a little bit at the gaze, wondering what else her friend could've been thinking.

"I was mad at you because you looked so troubled and confused" the girl went on further to let her feelings and reasoning out, "You often looked like you were dazing off somewhere"

"eto…" Nanoha had to wipe her sleeve across her face to wipe away some of the tears she had. She gazed at her friends with that cute, adorable smile of hers, "I know what I want to do now… And it may be dangerous, but I promise I'll come back to you two when I'm done."

"No matter where you are or what you do" Suzuka added, her expression sincere as her face, "We'll be behind you all the way."

"Yeah!" Alisa grinned teasingly toward her friend, figuring she could sneak in a little suggestive line, "Suzuka's fun to play with. But, I really enjoy having fun with y- uguuu!"

"Personal foul!" Sonic interrupted the perverted girl's antics with a pillow to the head. It was thankful that he did as poor Nanoha's face could've rivalled a tomato with how red her face was, "That's a five cookie penalty and I'm going to relieve my apparent older sister from you as it's time for us to head home. We've got a long day."

"Thanks, Sonic-kun" Nanoha recovered fast and joined her hedgehog's side, waving goodbye to her friends.

After retrieving the almost-forgotten Yuuno from the metaphorical dog house and took him home, Nanoha and Sonic had a little chat with their family to inform them of the plans the following morning. From their view, Nanoha's parents were glad, their child finally looked to have her worries figured out.

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, residential district]<br>[Takamachi Residence]  
>[Time: 5:27 AM]<br>[BGM: "Spring Yard" Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis)]**

Nanoha, Yuuno and Sonic had gotten off to an early start to the morning. So early that the sun hadn't risen just yet as the three had started to make their way toward the park; the reasoning was almost simple. The part was the place where they had fought a tree possessed by a Jewel Seed. The three were at a running pace, well to be specific, Nanoha and Yuuno were at a run while Sonic only had to jog.

"Ah.." The blue hedgehog looked to his right and smirked, "Oy, 3 o'clock Nanoha.

"Eh?" the girl had to think a bit before she realized that Sonic was referring to the direction versus the time. As she looked, she almost grinned when she saw a fully-healed Arf running on the elevated wall above them, "Arf-san!"

The wolf said nothing, merely nodding as she leaped over to the left side of Sonic and Nanoha. There was no doubt to the wolf's drive; she was determined to save her master, and she finally felt confident that she had enough backup to do so.

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari Seaside Park]<br>[Time: 5:55 AM]  
>[BGM: "Spring Yard" Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis)<strong>

There the four stood, at the ocean view area of the park. They all stood, or sat in Arf's case, in place. Looking over the peaceful view of the ocean in waiting patience; they were waiting for either the Bureau to pick them up, or for Fate to show up. Whichever came first mattered little for the group, though Nanoha had her own little preference as to which event.

"It's all right if it's here, ne?" The girl sighed and stared at the ground, "Please come out, Fate-chan!"

The girl's plead was greeted by only silence; aside from the rustling of the wind. The silence gave the possibility that Fate probably wasn't going to show up. Either that, or she was waiting for the right moment to make a dramatic entrance, something that Sonic had speculated.

"Okay, can something happen within the next five seconds?" Sonic said out loud in impatience and exasperation as he laid on his back and tapped his gloved finger against his shoe, "We're waaaaaaaaiting~!"

"_**Scythe form!"**_ Bardiche's declaration of said form seemed to answer the impatience of the blue hedgehog as Fate appeared on the top of a light post.

"Fate! Let's stop this now!" Arf tried to plead with her master; pleading that Fate would answer to reason and stop the madness and pain, "You shouldn't listen to what that woman tells you!

"Fate, you'll end up more and more miserable if you keep going." The wolf's tone and expression displayed her true feelings of worry as she made her last plea an emotional one, "So please, Fate!"

"Gomen, Arf…" The girl softly shook her head, she didn't like putting her familiar through all the emotional pain, but she felt like she had not choice, "I'm still her daughter."

"Well… you tried" Sonic shook his head with a shrug, patting the wolf with his gloved palm as he turned to face Nanoha, "Alright, this is your show now, Nanoha"

Nanoha nodded, closed her eyes and spread her arms out as her magic engulfed her. Quickly she changed into her Barrier Jacket and Raising Heart shifted to its Default/Device form. She stared at the girl with determination in her eyes.

"It's not good enough to just throw it away" Nanoha said, "And it's even worse if I were to run away.

"I'm sure it all started with the Jewel Seeds" The girl set down her own gauntlet and stared Fate down, "So we both should risk every Jewel Seed we have!"

"_**Put out!"**_ Raising Heart declared as each and every one of Nanoha's collected Jewel Seeds appeared to surround the girl. Nanoha had staked her bet

"_**Put out!"**_ Bardiche, in turn did the same, signaling Fate's unspoken agreement to the terms. Fate, for her part, remained silent and stoic through it all.

"This is where it starts.. where it all starts" Nanoha declared her feelings once more to a silent Fate as she pointed the tip of Raising Heart at the girl.

Fate remained silent, only the gesturing movement of the scythe form Bardiche served as any acknowledgement to the girl. The girl felt too many emotions that conflicted with one another. Her devotion to her mother clashed with the pain the woman had brought her. Arf's own feelings had played into that inner turmoil. There was one thing that she couldn't doubt. She had to give this upcoming battle all she had, for her mother and the Jewel Seeds.

"Nothing between us has even started yet." Nanoha said as she put her piece to a close, "So to start our true selves...

"Let's begin…"

**[Ending: "Little Wish~ Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 12]<strong>

Author's notes: More plot twists galore! And anyone else expected Arf to change sides? She could only take so much of Fate's pain and would do anything to save her. And yes. Yuuno had to get his justice due… No more onsens for him~! Anyways! Cliffhanger! Yes! Big big battle coming up next chapter! Nanoha versus Fate! The key matchup that decides it all.


	13. Chapter 13

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter to Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar. I'm not going to waste time (and words) on any long openings; I'm just going to go right into it. I don't own Sonic the Hedgehog, Eggman, etc.. They belong to Sonic Team. I don't own any Nanoha characters or anything from her series; they belong to Seven Arcs. Let's go!

* * *

><p><em><strong>-Flashback: Appx 26+ years ago-<br>[Mid-Childa: Location unknown]  
>[Time: Unknown]<br>**_**[BGM: "Daijoubu da yo" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

_It was a beautiful spring day on Mid-Childa many, many years ago. For Fate Testarossa, this was one of the many recurring memories she had of the way things used to be with Precia. The two were spending quality time together during a picnic._

_The weather was a bit on the chilly side for the spring, but that was why the two were in long-sleeved attire. Precia had worn a blue long skirt with a purplish long-sleeved shirt. As for Fate, she wore a light-blue long-sleeved dress, which upon hindsight, was one of a few things she might've thought different when she compared to the dark pink, black and white attire. Her hair was styled different too; bluish green bows had tied up only a portion of her hair into tails while the rest flowed freely._

_Not that this mattered to Fate at all. This memory was still precious to her because it reminded her of just how her mother used to be. The woman in mention was seated on her knees right next to a picnic basket. She appeared to be making some cute crown of sort with her hands. What drew the most amount of attention was that the woman had not a single hint of animosity, only kindness and gentleness that a mother could have when spending well-earned time with her child._

'_Kaa-san… Yes, my kaa-san' Fate spoke of the woman in her thoughts in a reflective tone, 'She was always so tender… that was my kaa-san… the one who'd call my name so gently…'_

"_Nee, look! Isn't this really pretty?" Precia, as if on cue with the memory, presented to the girl who looked so much similar to Fate a crown of flowers. The mother's tone was so gentle, it was as if she loved this girl. There was one little oversight, the name Precia had said; "Alicia?"_

'_Alicia?' Fate paused with a startle. She was confused; that wasn't her name!, 'N-no.. Kaa-san.. My name is Fate..'_

"_Come closer" Precia held out her arms wide; inviting the girl into her embrace; again, the name was wrong for Fate, "Alicia"_

_To Fate's growing confusion; the girl who looked so much like her didn't pause. She didn't try to correct the woman; instead she leaned forward on her knees closer to the kind mother. Once in arms range, the woman kindly placed the cute crown of flowers on her daughter's head. Fate didn't know what to think, this was her memory, right? She certainly remembered everything; the cool breeze flowing through her hair, the crown of flowers placed on top of her head; everything. _

"_There, you are so cute.." Precia kindly serenaded the girl that was her daughter, "My lovely Alicia."_

_The beautiful Fate look-alike said little with that cute voice, but her smile spoke wonders. Happiness, this girl was almost in heaven as she giggled joyfully. The memory felt so right for Fate, even without the discrepancies._

* * *

><p><em><strong>-Flashback end-<strong>_

**[Uminari Seaside Park]  
>[Time: 5:59 AM]<br>[BGM: "Kinkyuu Jitai" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

'_Well.. That's alright'_ Fate shrugged the memory's inconsistencies aside. With Bardiche, her ever so trusted device and partner, held in Scythe form; the blonde stared ahead at the white-clad girl that was her rival.

Determination was even further evident in those crimson eyes as the girl seemed to just do nothing for the moment. Her mind full of the more recent flashbacks of Arf and Precia while at the Garden of Time. Even though she was in apparent pain throughout all the recent memories; she still held love for that woman.

'_Because I love my gentle kaa-san so much, I will…'_ The girl's thoughts trailed off as she took to the skies and readied herself in a battle-ready stance. This was one fight that she would give all that she had to.

* * *

><p><strong>[Opening: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 13<br>Memories That Lie Beyond Time**

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration L-Class Dimensional Cruise Vessel "Asura"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The Time-Space Administration should receive a ton of credit for their proactivity for the event such as what was about to happen on Earth. For the past few minutes prior to the meeting of Fate and Nanoha, a covert detachment of Bureau mages were sent down to the planet to set up Barriers and scrying sphere spells. They did more than just cover the park and the ocean bay; there was an older district next to the park that was also encased in the barrier. The district was rundown and abandoned for a long time anyway, and it would've been set for demolition.

The reason for this was to ensure that the two girls would have a lot of room to duke it out while at the same time keep civilians safe as they wouldn't be able to step into the barriers in the first place. For that same reason, the trio of Sonic, Yuuno and Arf were "led" away from the epicenter of the battle so that they wouldn't interfere.

Overlooking and reviewing the footage of the scrying sphere spells was Amy Limietta and Chrono Harlaown. As he watched the teen brunette sit down, the resident enforcer couldn't help but notice an ahoge of Amy's hair stick up from the back of her head like an antenna.

"Certainly looks like a battle has broken out" Amy commented, oblivious to the extra antenna of hair, "Good thing our crew spent a lot of time setting up Barrier"

"Yeah" Chrono, exercising plenty of willpower, let the extra antenna stand for another moment.

"But it is really unusual to allow that kind of a gamble" Amy said, once again as that little antenna of hair bounced almost as it if was alive, tempting the boy further to fix it.

"Well…" The boy started to say as he snuck what appeared to be a spray bottle into his right hand and started to shake it repeatedly, "It'd be best if Nanoha wins… but either way, it won't really matter in the grand scheme of things who falls first"

"While Nanoha-chan is buying us time during her match.." Amy turned a side-glance to the boy enforcer, not noticing that bottle in the right hand, "I was thinking that I should prepare the tracking system so we can see where the other girl will return to."

"I'm counting on you" The boy let the nuisance of hair tease him no more and sprayed a fluid from the apparent hairspray bottle on the ahoge of hair. Somehow having already snuck a brush into his left hand, Chrono ran the brush once downwards over the hair; not once did he allow his speech to leave the current train of thought, "Don't let her get away again."

"Of course! Leave it to me!" The girl turned to face the boy and look him square in the eyes; interrupting him before he could give a second thought of repeating the brushing motion. Perhaps that wasn't the wisest of ideas as that darn annoying ahoge sprung right back up again; this time noticeable by the girl, "Ara?"

"Ah…" The boy stared for a moment at the apparently semi-alive strand of hair. He attempted to reach out and help the brunette keep it in check but found himself blocked as the girl decided to use her own hands to stroke her hair and style the ahoge away.

**[BGM: "Ketsudan no Toki" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

"Is it really okay not to tell Nanoha-chan?" the brunette asked in reference to another recent discovery that they had recently unearthed as early as this morning and withheld it from the girl in question, "About Precia Testarossa's family… and that accident."

"It'd be best if she wins on her own." Chrono approached the screen with the two girls featured begin their battle; a serious expression on the boy's face, "I don't want her to hesitate in the slightest right now."

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari Seaside Park]  
>[Air Combat Zone]<br>[No BGM]**

Meanwhile with said battle, Nanoha and Fate opened up with a round of high-speed physical clashes. The strategy behind their aerial clash was for either girl to gain an early advantage and create distance for the shooting spells. Simple, but effective if it worked for either girl; which, for Fate, she appeared to get that first advantage and knocked Nanoha downward. The white-clad mage only bounced once or twice off the water before regaining her flight stability, thankfully.

"Nanoha!" Yuuno, who had remained in ferret form for a moment or two, struggled to watch from the shared vantage point he had with Arf and Sonic. He had currently suffered a downside to his smaller form, he couldn't see much between the gated bars of the rooftop, "Damn, can't see that well."

"Shall I describe it to you, Tutorial Ferret?" Sonic, not one to let a chance of heckling the ferret boy slip by, turned to face the ferret with a grin, "Or would you like me to find you a box?"

"Heh heh heh heh!" Arf found that the lack of hands made it difficult to suppress her humor of the hedgehog's clever quip. For that, and many other reasons, the wolf changed her form to that of her wolf-woman self. Much better, now she had a better view of the action.

"I'm an idiot sometimes" The ferret boy, after allowing himself a moment of self-criticism, shifted to his human form and gripped the edge of the railing.

Arf and Yuuno continued to watch as Nanoha and Fate clashed in midair. There wasn't much that they could do; as it was a one-on-one match, there was a rule against outside interference. Despite that, they still couldn't help but feel for the girls as they watched.

**[Battle: Nanoha Vs Fate]  
>[BGM: "Paradigm Shift" Final Fantasy XIII-2 OST]<strong>

Fate had initiated a chase of her white-clad rival. The pursuit took the two weaving between buildings and other obstacles. While Fate had the advantage of speed, Nanoha had advantage or two of her own in her flight control and strategic use of the buildings between the two.

"_**Photon Lancer!"**_ Bardiche declared as soon as the two got to a straight-away in the pursuit. Within seconds of declaring so, a volley of lightning element lancers surrounded Fate's person; ready to fire. Unfortunately for Nanoha, she made the mistake of turning to face the black-clad blonde and gasped.

"Fire!" the girl shouted and sent the bolts on their way to the rival target. Fortunately Nanoha was lucky enough to swerve and avoid the majority of the shots and use the building up ahead of her as cover for the rest as she made an upward aerial climb.

Nanoha's fortune seemed to work in her favor again as the momentum from her aerial climb allowed her to get right behind Fate and initiate a pursuit of her own. If a pattern was to be followed, Nanoha probably would've used Fate's example and use a shooting volley of her own.

"_**Divine Shooter!"**_ Sure enough, that was what Raising Heart had thought her master was going to do as well and a volley of the aforementioned shooter spell was already set up.

"Shoot!" the girl declared and sent the bullets at Fate. This was where her fortune ended as Fate was easily able to avoid the first volley.

An advantage that Fate had over Nanoha also included a bit of power as she was able to utilize Bardiche's scythe form and slash away another volley. There was a lone Divine Shooter round that remained from the volley, but Fate chose to ignore it and merely swerve to make it miss as she went to use Bardiche's scythe to engage in close combat with the white rival.

With as much effort that she could put out, Nanoha was able to intercept Fate's melee strike with a Round Shield spell. The girl must've known that Fate was going to ignore the last bullet because she was about to try and make the blonde pay for doing so. With Fate busying herself with Nanoha's barrier, the lone shooter round re-directed itself and went for a dead-straight charge for Fate's back.

"_**Thunder Bullet!"**_ Unfortunately, as Bardiche's vocal declaration was of any clue, Fate was prepared for that.

"Fire!" With little delay between the declaration, Fate used her free left hand to pierce through Nanoha's Round Shield and impact the other girl point blank in the torso.

The impact served multiple purposes that Fate was trying to do. For one, she interrupted Nanoha's control of the lone Divine Shooter round, allowing herself to easily avoid the stray spell. At the same time, she used the impact to send the other girl on an uncontrolled crash course with an old building that was one of many obstacles. The impact had also generated a bright, yellowish explosion that came from the Thunder Bullet.

Believing that she had earned a moment or so to catch her breath, Fate ascended up to a rooftop within the barrier of the combat zone. Unfortunately for her, she was in for a major surprise when she found herself immediately soaring out of the way from a very powerful Divine Buster shot from the area that she had just knocked her rival to. The Buster may have just missed Fate, but it did take a small chunk from the rooftop she was just on, and that was just to show how close Nanoha was in targeting her.

'_When we first met, she was just a novice with strong powers and little control… but now she's so different from before… so fast… and so strong'_ Fate couldn't help but feel impressed by the improvement of her own rival, _'If I hesitate again, I'll be beaten!'_

Meanwhile, from Nanoha's perspective, she took that last spell from Fate rather well if she was still able to pull off a Divine Buster in that short amount of time. However, while she was more-or-less surprised by the Thunder Bullet spell; that still didn't mean that she was off the hook. She had her own luck, but it wasn't going to help her much longer.

"_**She is more advanced than you"**_ Raising Heart cautioned her master from the naïve thought of underestimating the difficulty of the battle, _**"You won't beat her easily"**_

"We're using all of the wisdom and tactics that we have, but we have a trump card or two of our own" Nanoha said to the wise device; she wasn't about to stray from her own course, "All we have to do is hit her with all that we have, right?"

"_**All right!"**_ It may have taken Raising Heart a bit of a pregnant pause or two to respond, but she was in agreement with her master, _**"Master!"**_

**[POV Shift: Observing trio]**

Meanwhile with the observant trio from the rooftop, many of their senses were at work. They could see the girls clash in air and hear the occasional trading of spells. If there was anything off about the scene, it would've been an odd smell. A smell of, butter and salt had confused the two, and it was joined by the sounds of munching to Arf's right and sure enough, she turned in that direction and almost gawked.

While their masters were out clashing against one another in a duel within the barrier; Arf's counterpart was eating popcorn. And to add to that, Sonic appeared to have brought way too much for him as the tub of freshly popped corn almost was as big as the hedgehog!

"Really?!" Arf stared at her familiar counterpart in exasperation; her hands were settled at her hips to match that exasperated body language.

"What?" Sonic countered with a shrug of his left shoulder and a munching of popcorn from his right.

"Your master's out there risking her lift in this all-or-nothing duel" Yuuno was almost in full-on rant mode himself, "And you're just standing there, eating popcorn?!"

"Why not?" the blue hedgehog shrugged and argued his reasoning, "For one: It's not like we can help them anyways, we're not allowed to. For two: I'm not content to just sit on my tail and watch. Three: How often do we get to see a great show like this? The action's getting good!"

"Ah.." Arf was actually stumped. Her counterpart actually brought a few fair points to the argument. They weren't allowed to interfere in the fight, and it's difficult to just stand and watch. On another note, that fresh scent of butter and salt was just too inviting for her and she held out her hand in hopes that her counterpart would share, "Care to share?"

"Huh?!" Yuuno gawked at Arf as he watched Sonic pass some over to the wolf with an obvious smirk on his face, "Arf-san too?!"

"Just give up.." Sonic shrugged, "I made too much for me, so someone's gotta help me make sure it doesn't go to waste"

"Fine… but don't expect me to like it" the ferret boy grumbled but relented to take his own handful of that freshly popped goodness. After tasting the corn, the ferret found the need to rethink his thoughts, "I take that back.."

"Thought you would" the hedgehog grinned and continued to multi-task in eating and watching the great battle.

**[POV: Battle]  
>[BGM: "Crimson Blitz" Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII OST]<strong>

Whether they were aware of their familiar's snacking over their battle, which was doubtful, the girls continued their epic aerial battle of magic power and strategy. It was no secret that Fate had the advantage of advancement, power and experience over Nanoha, but that didn't mean that the battle was any easier. Nanoha made that fact for certain as she initiated a pursuit with Fate again.

Nanoha had opted to chase Fate for a multiple of reasons including the need to keep some pressure on the blonde. She did that in the form of mixing a volley of Divine Shooter rounds and sending them off to chase the girl. Fate, of course, used her speed and agility to easily avoid the majority of shots and the buildings to intercept the rest.

Fate had just as quickly run out of patience in being on the wrong end of the aerial chicken dogfight. With her speed and power, she once again forced Nanoha to engage in the high-speed melee clash again. Tactics changed for her again as she engaged in more shooting and melee mixed combat.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Garden of Time]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The Time-Space Administration wasn't the only party interested in the results from the clash of Nanoha and Fate. Precia had also watched the duel from her own scrying methods inside of the Garden of Time's throne room. She watched Fate and glanced back to the portrait that she had of when her daughter was a mere 5 year old.

Upon reflection of her current actions, not even Precia could doubt the pain that she had caused the poor girl, in spite of the hard effort she was given in return. In the back of her mind, memories continued to haunt her conscious. The pain that she caused was hard for even her to justify, yet she couldn't deny it.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari Seaside Park]  
>[Air Combat Zone: within the barrier]<br>[No BGM]**

The memories of that accident were brought up to Fate's mind as she continued to fight. She remembered the bright yellow light from her mother's lab and her loss of consciousness. She remembered waking up in, what her time would've been, a few days, but her mother explaining it to be far longer than that. The kind, gentle Precia carried little Fate to her new room. She had promised to take the girl on a picnic or to the amusement park after the experiment. Fate clearly remembered comforting her mother with her lead, right, hand; shocking the woman for a moment. And there it was again, the name..

"Alicia…" Fate spoke softly, so soft that her rival was unable to hear her, _'N-no! My name is Fate!'_

'_Not this again!'_ the blonde shook off the repeated mention of "Alicia" in the memories of her mother. Name inconsistencies or not, she was still determined to win this battle and return to her Mother. Return the mother to the kind, gentle mother she used to be.

**[BGM: "World's Collide" Final Fantasy XIII-2 OST]**

Fate soon created separation from herself and Nanoha once again, this time she had a trick or two up her sleeve to try out. This was going to be it for her; her trump card of a spell. Focusing her power, she quickly generated as many lightning elemental lancers that she could come up with in one go, which were apparently upon the dozens. As Nanoha was taken by surprise from the sudden action, Fate capitalized on the girl's emotion and trapped her in place with binding spells of the lightning element

**[POV Shift: Observing trio]**

"That's a trap-type bind…" Yuuno noted in observation and noted the actions from Fate's side, "And… isn't that?"

"Fate!" Arf noticed it too.

"That's a lot of lightning bolt things…" Sonic dropped the tub of popcorn; eh he wouldn't mind the loss anyway on hindsight; too much butter and salt. His focus was on the white-clad girl that was his master. He quickly noted the tightening of the girl's grip and Raising Heart's pinkish glow, "Heh… doesn't look like she's worried about it…"

**[POV Shift: Battle]**

Lightning sparkled between the dozens of lancers on Fate's side of the battle. One of the many testaments and example of her pure power was the fact that she apparently didn't wince a bit from the output. No question about it, however, this spell was going to be all-or-nothing for the girl.

"Phalanx…" The girl softly declared as she raised Bardiche up high. Her soft voice and tone instantly raised in volume as she shouted "Smash her to pieces!"

Upon such a loud declaration, Fate unleashed her powerful Phalanx Shift of the Photon Lancer. The bolts rushed for Nanoha at a rapid pace that, combined with the bindings on said girl's person, would be sure for a direct hit. They were, if Nanoha's grunts from her bracing for impact were any indication. However, if there was one downside to the rapid-fire volley Fate was aware of, it was that not all of the numerous bolts would hit her target. She was well set up for that as well. She prepared to end the volley wave with one last finishing blow. The girl held up her left hand she combined the excess spheres from the phalanx shift into one large lancer.

"Spark.." Fate began the aria and threw the last lancer at the girl, "End"

The resulting impact created a huge explosion that, if not for the convenient location above the water, it might've caught a good portion of the town in its wake too. If any damage to property was done, it was to the long-forgotten buildings and ruins of said buildings. Thankfully, no civilians, they were more important, besides buildings can be rebuilt.

Once her spell was complete, Fate allowed herself to take yet another long and deep breath while Bardiche let out an excess of steam from the output. The girl continued to just float in mid-air and breathe; her exhaustion plainly evident from the workload she just put out. Her eyes were locked at the dust that her target was in; waiting to see the result of her metaphorical "home run ball".

The dust settled to reveal, to the surprise of all with the exception of a certain blue hedgehog, Nanoha; alive, conscious and, with the exception of her Barrier Jacket sporting a few cuts and marks here and there and the most damage to the left sleeve of said jacket, unharmed. Looks like Fate's home-run attempt was just short of the metaphorical wall.

"_**Can you move, Master?"**_ Raising Heart queried to her master

"I'm good to go" Nanoha confirmed, holding out the aforementioned device in her left hand, "Raising Heart"

"_**Cannon Mode!"**_ The device declared and once again shifted to the combined bombardment and sealing form mix.

**[POV Shift: Observing trio]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

"HA HA HA! I KNEW IT!" Sonic was literally jumping for joy and had apparently, somehow changed outfits to a cheerleader outfit; skirt, shirt and all, themed to the pink, white, red and yellow tint colors of Nanoha, "I knew she was going to be fine!"

"This from the boy who accidentally dropped his popcorn before we could eat half" Arf commented off-handedly; and then nearly face-faulted when she noticed the choice of attire that Sonic somehow managed to dress himself in; "C-cheerleader?! How the?"

"Don't ask" Yuuno sighed in exasperation, knowing that with the hedgehog's predictability being comparable to a roulette table, "Just go with it"

"Actually…" Arf had taken a second look, noting that with the hedgehog's short size, hedgehog-like quills and spikes, he didn't look too bad; "He actually makes that outfit look cute"

"Let's go Nanoha! Let's go!" Unpredictable or not, Sonic showed how much he supported his slightly older sister figure with his enthusiastic cheering. He even went so far as to carry pinkish pom-poms that he somehow brought out of nowhere. Even on hindsight, he probably wouldn't regret or feel any embarrassment for the outfit; he wanted to support his master/friend/sister, "Go! Go! Nanoha!"

**[POV Shift: Battle]  
>[BGM: "Crimson BlitzBlinded by Light" Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII OST]**

Unfortunately for Fate, she had her chance for the home run ball and came up short; now it was her rival's chance for such a feat. There wasn't much she could do for that matter either as the blonde girl suddenly found her hands and feet bound in place by wheels of pink mana. Nanoha's go-to binding spell, the Restrict Lock, had helped her against many Jewel Seed beasts and it once again helped her in this battle.

"A bind… but when… H-huh!" Fate had to check her own short term memory to figure out when Nanoha was able to set up such a feat as a delayed binding spell. It didn't take her long to realize it was when she, herself, was setting up the Phalanx Shift Photon Lancer. Had she been paying more attention, she might've noticed a flash of pink between her feet when she raised Bardiche up to send off the Phalanx Shift.

Unfortunately for her, she didn't, and she found herself on the targeting end of Nanoha's other go-to bombardment sealing spell, the Divine Buster. The familiar orb of pink magic energy was generated at the tip of Raising Heart's Cannon Mode.

"Divine…" Target locked on and confirmed, Nanoha had the poor Fate dead-set in her sights, "Buster!"

With only a slight tug of Raising Heart's trigger to signify her action, Nanoha fired the Divine Buster at Fate. Fortunately for Fate, the firing of said spell had cancelled the bindings on Fate's arms. That action allowed the girl to try and intercept the Buster with a Round Shield spell of her own.

"She should be at her limit too… I should be able to endure this!" Fate thought out loud as she tried to hold off the Buster with her gloved left hand and Round Shield. She knew the reasons why she could've held off the Buster as well. Having a Familiar or not, her rival still wouldn't be able to match her in terms of power and experience. That and the girl had to fight off the spell that she had just pulled off.

It came at a cost of most of her left glove and the cloak on her back, but Fate was able to outlast the Buster. The girl allowed herself to sigh in relief, but found it short-lived as she could feel a strange, almost uplifting feeling from the magic around her. It was almost as if the magic energy from the environment was being drawn upward and into the sky.

A pink light from a higher altitude and a look upward confirmed that detail. Way up high into the clouds, Nanoha floated in place, at the tip of Raising Heart was yet again another orb of pink mana, only this one seemed to be growing even further in size as she was drawing power.

**[BGM Insert: "Tsudoe, Hoshi no Kagayaki ~Starlight Breaker~" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha the MOVIE 1****ST**** OST]**

"_**Starlight Breaker"**_ Raising Heart chimed out the declaration of this new spell, or was it a new spell? It gathered energy at the tip like the Divine Buster, but it held a different name for a reason.

"Collect the unused magic that we've scattered around and bring it all together." Nanoha said as a large, circular ring of pink magic energy surrounded a wide radius around the orb of which the magic energy was being gathered up. It was purely awe-inspiring; this girl was literally drawing all of the excess energy from the battle; the same energy that might've been overlooked as just leftover energy from their high-powered duel. The overall area was saturated with the magic, so it was a lot to gather.

"A magical focused attack…" Fate was left in awe and she couldn't help but stare at the feat

"This is my final ace in the hole…" with a flick of her device, Nanoha manipulated the gathered magic orb to increase in size until it was almost 2/3 of the actual diameter of the pink ring surrounding the energy orb, "Raising Heart's "wisdom and tactics"!"

Like a heart that was beating, the gathered magic seemed to thump as it almost bounced off the ring that was able to hold it in place. One could almost feel the magic in the air as the magical energy was almost anxious to be released.

"Try this on for size." Nanoha declared as she pointed the tip of Raising Heart at the center of the orb, but didn't make any physical contact with it just yet, "This is all that I have! Zeryoku Zenkai!"

For Fate, it was a lose-lose; there was no way she could interrupt the spell this late in its preparation; and there was no way she'd be able to cover enough ground even with the speed of her flight to avoid the spell's bombardment range of effect. That didn't mean that she was about to take the spell like a sitting duck, however. In a last ditch effort of defense, the girl sent out a string of magical shields of her lightning element.

"Starlight Breaker!" Nanoha declared and finally struck the massive orb of power. The orb itself exploded and unleashed a powerful bombardment beam in that pink hue. As the blast blocked her line of sight, the girl couldn't see so much, not that she needed to.

The Starlight Breaker had engulfed almost the entire battlefield inside the barrier in the pink light. The only thing that anyone might've seen from the outside was the small string of shield spells that, for maybe a second or two, kept Fate from harm. However, those shields stood absolutely no chance from the sheer force of power coming from the Starlight Breaker; and Fate found herself seeing pink in no time and fell victim to the almighty blast.

**[No BGM]**

The explosions from the Breaker did plenty more than just affect the oceanic battlefield. They blew up debris, rock and etcetera; anything that had the misfortune of being between the bombardment spell and the barrier that the Time-Space Administration mages spent so much work in setting up.

When her spell had run its course and the metaphorical dust settled, Nanoha took a huge breath and could feel almost exhausted as Raising Heart let out excess steam that the device built up from the massive spell. Despite her own moment of exhaustion, there was one thing, or person, that Nanoha was worried about, her rival. She could see what appeared to be an unconscious body of black, pink and yellowish blonde, fall down into the water.

"Fate-chan!" Nanoha shouted as she rapidly descended into the ocean and quickly caught her unconscious rival in a, perhaps fittingly so, heroic bridal carry.

With her load safely in hand, the white-clad brunette soared up onto a nearby shoreline. Once safely out of the water, Nanoha laid Fate down on her back and patiently waited for her to regain consciousness. There was little delay as the blonde girl had slowly regained her senses and consciousness. A small watery cough was the only clue Nanoha would need.

"Huh.." Slowly, but surely, Fate opened her eyes; her crimson eyes locked on with the purplish blues of Nanoha. That was one of the few clues that the girl needed to know what had just happened; she had lost, fair and square.

"I'm sorry… Are you alright?" Nanoha asked softly and apologetically, her primary concern was the condition of her rival as she helped the blonde sit up, "Can you stand?"

Silence, Fate didn't say a word as she just floated. What could she have said anyway? She lost to a novice. A fight that she should've won, but she didn't. All of her memory and determination, and she came up short? Her mother would not be pleased.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Garden of Time]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Precia had seen enough; she had seen the entire battle from start to end. Fate had disappointed her once more. There was no question in the woman's mind that could deny Fate's hard work and her best effort. The reality of the matter, however, was the results; and there was no fruit to Fate's labor.

"That's enough. Fate…" Precia stood up and walked to the center of the large throne room, "I'm done with you"

Once again, the woman had opted to take matters into her own hands. She'd be the first to say, however, that she wished the results were different. Self-preservation was among a few of the reasons behind that chain of thought as she had to focus her power into another dimensional attack.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari Seaside Park]  
>[POV: Observing trio]<br>[BGM: "Enemy Attack" Final Fantasy X OST Remaster]**

2 Familiars and one Tutorial Ferret boy were among the first to notice the sudden forecast change as the clouds rolled in to cover the early-morning sun in a dark wisp. Another storm was brewing; another unnatural and uncalled for storm. The foreboding feeling alone from the clouds was drastically noticeable.

"I can feel magic in the clouds.." Yuuno said with a slight gulp

"Precia…" Arf needed only one guess to figure out who was behind this storm, "That woman…"

"This wasn't in the forecast" Sonic added with a smile that took a lot of effort to force out, "And I didn't bring my umbrella.."

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration L-class Dimensional Cruise Vessel "Asura"]  
>[BGM: "Enemy Attack" Final Fantasy X OST Remaster]<strong>

To say that the sensors of the Asura lit up like a Christmas tree wouldn't have been an over exaggeration at this point; because the upcoming storm of magic had once again wreaked havoc to the ship and her crew once again.

"Photonic magic detected!" Amy declared as her computer made the alert and connection to the familiar foe in record time, "It has the same wavelength as Precia Testarossa!

"Incoming dimensional strike on the combat zone!" the teen wasted no time in alerting the group of civilian assistants on the ground, "Nanoha-chan, Sonic-kun, Yuuno-kun."

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari Seaside Park]  
>[Air Combat Zone]<br>[BGM: "Enemy Attack" Final Fantasy X OST Remaster]**

The familiar bolts of purplish lightning struck the seaside park and the combat zone within. The magical storm of Precia Testarossa's wrath had come to strike yet again. The storm made the whole area unsafe, including the little rooftop vantage point of the familiars and Tutorial Ferret.

"We have about two seconds to bail here, guys!" Sonic was the first to take to the skies after he shifted to his Barrier Jacket in record time, "To the skies!"

"You don't need to tell me what to do!" Arf, for lack of the better verb, barked at the hedgehog counterpart but nevertheless, she didn't need to be told twice and was able to escape before any lightning could strike their location.

"Oy, wait up!" Yuuno was the lone straggler and he managed to take flight of his own just before he could've been grazed, let alone hit by the lightning.

Nanoha couldn't do much for the moment as she watched Fate seemed to show little reaction of surprise to the sudden storm. But if that lone feeling deep in the back of her mind was correct, the storm wasn't about to let Fate go without striking her.

"Fate-chan!" the brunette tried to call after her rival and take flight to stop her from being struck like before.

"Kaa-san…" the blonde looked up to the eye of the storm and watched the magical lightning flash about. Sure enough, like last time, she was engulfed by a flash of purple light and fell victim to the powerful lightning storm.

"Fate-chan!" Nanoha had tried to grab the girl with as momentum that she could gather, but alas it was in vain as she took another shockwave blow and was forced back, "Aaah!"

Ever the persistent one, however, Nanoha boosted her flight speed via magic and was able to catch Fate in the bridal-style carry just before the poor, barely conscious girl could've landed in the lightning conducted drink.

The nine Jewel Seeds, the very same ones that Fate had wagered in her bet; were instantly caught up in the storm and brought back to Precia's lair.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration L-class Dimensional Cruise Vessel "Asura"]  
>[BGM: "Enemy Attack" Final Fantasy X OST Remaster]<strong>

"I've determined the origin of the magical energy!" Amy Limietta was quick to calculate and back trace the source of the magic behind the dimension hopping storm, "Spatial coordinates… confirmed!"

"Transfer coordinates set" informed one uniformed tech from the cockpit of the cruise patrol warship.

"Infiltration unit, move out through the transfer port." Admiral Lindy's orders were swift and just. She was not about to let Precia get away with another dimensional disturbance this time around.

"Your mission is to take Precia Testarossa into custody" the woman's voice was heard through the sound system of the ship, well into the dimensional gate launch pad; where there was already a group of battle-hardened mages ready to go.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Garden of Time]  
>[BGM: "Enemy Attack" Final Fantasy X OST Remaster]<strong>

"_**Intruders detected!"**_ The Garden of Time's security system was quick to detect the sudden influx of Bureau mages intruding on the premises,_** "Many intruders are in the garden!"**_

Precia was overtaken by another bloody coughing fit. She knew full well that it was the price to pay for her workload in the spell she had just cast. However, she was not about to throw in the towel and give in so easily with the

"It's… not over yet…" the woman, despite struggling slightly to do so, stood up and wiped the blood from her lips. Despite her struggles, she was still able to limp her way back onto her almighty throne, "I have to keep my promise to my daughter…"

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration L-class Dimensional Cruise Vessel "Asura"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

With multiple devices, plus a scrying sphere spell cast to record the live feed of action; Lindy was able to receive live reports of her infiltration team's progress into the Garden of Time. From their report, they had just secured the first platoon entrance.

The door to the cockpit berth opening clued the woman to stand and approach the group of five that had just arrived from Earth. With civilian clothes for all except Fate, who was dressed in a simple pair of sweats and silver handcuffs on her wrists; Nanoha, Sonic, Yuuno, and Arf had brought Fate to see the Admiral.

"Good job everyone." Lindy had no shortage of positives to say for her helpers. Really, she was growing to like the trio with every day. The woman was not about to be rude to her new guest either for that matter as she addressed Fate with a kind, but polite tone, "And it's finally nice to meet you, Fate-san."

Fate had nothing to say once again, merely looking down at the slightly cracked surface of Bardiche's standby mode. Her silence was mirrored with Arf's own silence. Neither of the two had much to say; given the circumstances, it was hard to blame them.

"_It'd be unbearable for her to watch her mother's capture"_ Lindy turned to face the viewing screens once again, kindly sending a request to Nanoha in mindspeak in the process, _'Nanoha-san, please take her to a different room."_

"_Hai!"_ Nanoha complied and gestured to the blonde in her light grasp, "Fate-chan, if you'd like. I can take you to my room…"

Fate's silent refusal came as she slowly approached the viewing screens, recognizing the location of where the dispatched group of mages had successfully advanced to. It was almost too easy if some were to think of it in one way, nevertheless, the target had been found.

There she was, Precia Testarossa, seated almost casually in her chair. She was leaning slightly onto the right of said chair and might've been expecting the group of mages. Was she really about to let them take her in so easily, or was it just a ploy to lure them into a false sense of security.

"Precia Testarossa" the male officer mage in charge of the group addressed the woman with a large audience onboard the Asura watching closely, "You are under arrest for violations of Time-Space Administration Law, as we have suspicion of attacks against Administration Bureau vessels."

The woman under apparent arrest appeared almost bored of overly formal tone that the Bureau mage took in addressing her. The only sign that she had shown any emotion was when a small detachment of mages separated from the main group and rounded past her chair and into the hallway behind her.

The mages stumbled upon what appeared to be an old lab with test tubes and such. That wasn't the true shocker for the group and the audience on the ship. The biggest surprise laid right in the middle of the lab, and it was on full display for all to see. Nanoha and Sonic were shocked instantly.

Floating in a chamber of strange liquid and kept in almost pristine condition was what appeared to be another Fate? The girl looked so much like Fate-chan; same body, same hue of hair, if there was ever a difference between this girl and Fate, it would've been the lack of cuts or scars on her body, because her skin was void of blemishes and the like. Needless to say, Fate was shocked speechless.

"What the…." One mage in the laboratory room tried to identify the presence of the girl, but found his voice suddenly halted as he was grappled and thrown aside by Precia.

"Don't you dare come near my Alicia!" The woman said to the mages in a cold, but protective tone and with nary a second thought to her mind; she unleashed a powerful lightning spell and struck down several of the mages at once.

"Alicia?" Fate said slowly, recognizing that name once again. The same name that her own mother had called her in her memories.

"I don't know if we'll ever be able to reach Al Hazard with just nine Jewel Seeds" Precia spoke to the glass almost as if she was trying to talk to the apparently lifeless girl floating inside it, "But it's fine… I'm going to end this.

"I'm done with this time I've spent since I lost her…" Precia continued on, and either by accident or purposefully, let one more confusing bombshell drop, "And I'm done treating the puppet I made to replace her like a daughter"

Fate was absolutely startled once again. A puppet? Was that what she was? A puppet? But how; wasn't she Precia's daughter? She had all of her memories and remembered them like they were yesterday. But to find out from the mouth of the woman herself that she was just a puppet? It was unbelievable.

"Are you listening?" Precia's question was directed at Fate, almost as if she knew that the aforementioned girl was inside the room watching it all happen, "I'm talking about you, Fate.

"I went to all of the trouble of giving you her memories... but you are only identical to her on the outside." The woman offered a simple explanation that should've been easy for Fate to understand, the memories were just a gift in her creation, "You're useless and utterly worthless, my little doll."

"At the time of the first accident," Amy Limietta couldn't help but let a few tears escape her eyes as she offered the official explanation that she had unearthed. As helpful knowledge can be, it can also hurt, "Precia lost her biological daughter, Alicia Testarossa.

"There was a magic reactor meltdown caused by lapses in safety management and Alicia was caught in the blast." Amy continued on, reporting the results of her research with a heavy heart, "Or so it was apparent. Alicia's body wasn't found in the wreckage of the home. The Bureau investigated for all that they could, but had to presume the girl dead.

"Ever since then…" the girl went on about what Precia's new goals were and how they were linked to Fate in particular, "Precia's research has focused on the creation of artificial life, more advanced than that of Familiars.

"The name "Fate" came from the name of the research project that she had spearheaded" Despite the shocking truth that the revelations brought up, the report seemingly did not have an end, "The cloning technology used in Project Fate had also included a transcription of memories."

"That's right… That's exactly right…" Precia confirmed the truthfulness of everything that the brunette teen had reported, "But, it never helped bring back what I lost. Imitation life is just that. An imitation.

"Alicia was much kinder than you when she smiled." Precia turned to face the scrying screen and addressed Fate directly once more. Her attitude may have started to annoy one particular member with Fate, but it wasn't like she cared, "She was selfish too, but she always did as she was told"

"Stop it…" Nanoha tried to plead while her familiar's annoyance over the woman's tone seemed to grow. It took all of Nanoha's own willpower to keep Sonic's temper in check, but she knew that it was only a few ticks away from going off.

"Alicia was always so kind to me" Precia spoke almost lovingly and desperate about the girl behind the glass. She dropped another bombshell and said the words that would probably break poor Fate's heart, "Fate… you aren't my daughter. You're just a failure of mine. I don't need you anymore. Go wherever you want and get out of my sight!"

"Onegai!" Nanoha tried to plead with the woman to stop such saying vile and cruel words to a young confused girl while poor Fate looked just like her heart was just broken. As Nanoha pleaded, Sonic's temper had reached the metaphorical strike two, "Stop it already!"

"I'll let you in on a little secret, Fate." Precia either had finally given way to her insanity or found that she hadn't hurt the girl enough mentally to go with the physical scars, "Ever since I created you, I have always hated you."

That was it, Fate's heart had been broken. With a sudden gasp of surprise and shock, she had dropped Bardiche from her right palm. The yellow tringle gem that was Fate's lifelong partner and device seemed to fully represent Fate's own state perfectly as the front shattered into pieces. Fate's own consciousness was shattered as well as the girl lost any life to her eyes and fainted on the spot.

"Fate-chan!" Nanoha was quick to catch the girl before her body could've taken any more damage. It took her a lot of her own emotional strain to do so, but the girl was able to keep her familiar from losing his cool; instead she made him focus on a more pressing matter; Fate-chan's life.

"This is bad! Look at this!" Amy suddenly reported the numerous amounts of dimensional disturbances from the Garden of Time, "I'm detecting several magical signatures within Precia's compound!"

The activity from the signatures turned out to be a sudden mass influx of mechanical armored soldiers each being summoned by Precia's own magic. Everyone watched in shock, even Sonic, who had his share of robotic encounters. The blue hedgehog had seen robots based on animals and contraptions, but nothing like mechanized soldiers that Precia had conjured.

"All magical signatures are above the class A rank" a tech informed as he tried to isolate the number of signatures detected, "Sixty… eighty! And they're still going up!"

"Precia Testarossa!" Admiral Lindy had finally broken her own silence and addressed the not-so-kind woman herself, "What in the world are you up to?"

"We're setting out on a journey… a journey to Al Hazard!" the woman might've had a slight insane twitch of her eye or both as she released the capsule, which contained her apparently real biological daughter, from the containment field and levitated it back to the Throne Room, where the nine Jewel Seeds that Fate had collected for her floated in place.

"I'm going to use this power to make the trip and take everything I lost back!" The woman declared her plans for all to hear, "And I don't want anyone to interfere with my plan!"

With her own power, the woman forced the activation of the nine Jewel Seeds. If one was enough to cause a dimensional disturbance, then even a fraction of the 21 seeds collected were for sure about to cause a few quakes of their own. Needless to say, the Asura's sensors and alarms went haywire. Forget Christmas, this was a huge enough of a chain reaction to make Chernobyl look like a picnic!

"It's a dimensional quake!" Lindy was the first to shout out her orders to the crew, "Activate the dampeners!"

"The nine Jewel Seeds have activated and are getting stronger!" a sandy brown-haired man with glasses befitting a tech persona informed the admiral.

"Maintain transfer distance" The admiral's own level-headedness was put to the ultimate test with this major crisis, yet she held her own, "But maneuver evasively if you detect any feedback!"

"Understood!" The rest of whatever the technical staff had to say was lost on Nanoha and Sonic as their concern was for Fate. Almost for dear life and much like a friend should do, Nanoha held onto Fate in a tight hug while Sonic made it a group hug by almost clinging to Nanoha with Arf joining right in. Under different circumstances, this would've been a cute picturesque moment, but not now.

Chrono Harlaown sprinted down the hallways of the mighty warship, hoping to reach the gates and get himself down there to the Garden of Time. His storage device, the mechanical S2U held in device form in his right hand's grasp; the enforcer knew what he had to do and was willing to sacrifice his life to stop the woman.

'_The ancient land of forbidden technologies and magicks, Al Hazard'_ the boy thought back to all that he had heard about the mysterious land from what he had gathered in the historical texts,_ 'Does she really think she can recover what she lost there?!'_

Precia's cackling madwoman laugh echoed not only throughout the Garden of Time, but also through the v berth cockpit of the Asura. Needless to say, it rubbed a particular blue hedgehog the wrong way, but no matter how much he wanted to; Sonic was not about to do anything just yet. At least, not until his sister and master had run out of her own patience.

The girl in question knew what she had to do, that determined look on those purplish blue eyes stared right into the light-green eyes of her hedgehog brother and Familiar. Knowing what she was about to do next, Sonic stood up and let Nanoha do so right in front of him.

"_You're thinking what I'm thinking?"_ the brunette sent the question to the blue hedgehog, already knowing full well the answer.

"_Game on?" _the blue hedgehog offered with a slight smirk of excitement.

Either her familiar was rubbing off on her, or its was truly how Nanoha felt as she matched Sonic's smirk with one of her own; and she still never lost that cuteness in her face as a bonus. All that was left for her to do was to answer her familiar's own question.

"_Game on"_

**[To be continued!]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]<strong>

**[End of Chapter 13]**

Author's notes: Oh… my GOSH! I really think I outdid myself with this chapter! My goodness, I have never felt so confident about my work like this before. I really think I hit the nail hard on the head because of what I did for this chapter. Not only did I use footage from the original series episode this was based on, but I mixed it with what the actual 1ST MOVIE had used. Regardless, I have to say… I could go over this part of the Nanoha story as many times or as many ways that I can, but I still can't get over Fate.

For those who don't know, Project Fate was known in the Nanoha-verse canon as being an illegal project used to create artificial mages and forms of life with only the blood or DNA of an original copy to use as a base. Fate was arguably the first "real" success of said project as she was a clone of Alicia Testarossa. However, despite the perfect memories and the nearly flawless likeness that Fate held resemblance to Alicia. There was one little detail that painfully reminded Precia of just how close she came to the perceived failure. Alicia was left-handed; Fate is right-handed. And at the time Fate woke up, that was the only difference between her and Alicia.

Now, if some of you may note, I left a little hint or two in the dialogues from this chapter. One is the humorous reference to a movie, while the other is a bit of a bombshell within a bombshell plot twist. Can anyone find it? Go on; give it your best shot. Reviews, comments, what have you.. lets' put your mind to work and find the little references and stealthy bombshells in this chapter's dialogue.


	14. Chapter 14

SonicANIEM2010 here, bringing in another chapter to Lyrical Familiar; No chit-chats here again, I'm going right into the chapter. Usual disclaimers apply.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration L-Class Dimensional Cruise Vessel "Asura"]  
>[BGM: "Enemy Attack" Final Fantasy X OST Remaster]<strong>

Chaos; that was the best word to describe what was happening for the moment. The chaos has multiple fronts to it with a rather interesting cause and effect. The cause was from the dimensional quake that had come from the Garden of Time when Precia simultaneously activated the 9 Jewel Seeds in her possession. The effect was felt on the side of the Time Space Administration Warship that had anchored itself in Dimensional Space close to Precia's lair. The alarms of the warship were going practically haywire from it all. One must really credit the technical staff for they somehow managed to report their findings in a professional manner despite their own feelings of safety being compromised.

"Emergency!" one tech informed, "A dimensional tremor has occurred and its magnitude is increasing gradually!"

"If the magnitude continues to increase at this rate" the other tech informed just as fearfully but clearly professional, "A dimensional fault could be created in almost 30 minutes!"

"The reactors for the Garden of Time are Lost Logia themselves, and they have the same type as the Jewel Seeds!" Amy added from her seat after her readings of the scanners brought up more disturbing facts about the Garden of Time, "Precia Testarossa has engaged them, knowing full well of the risk that they might run out of control! She's trying to compensate for the power that she lacks from not attaining all of the Jewel Seeds!"

Lindy let out a gasp as she realized something from what the woman had said after breaking poor Fate-chan's heart. The woman had activated all of the Jewel Seeds in her possession for a specific purpose; it was everything or nothing for her now. There was little doubt that the power Precia had wouldn't be enough for a round-trip; it was even arguable that with all of the Jewel Seeds, there still would've been that doubt. Lindy was shocked the most when she had the feeling and realization that Precia knew that as well.

"She meant this to be a one-way trip from the very beginning!" The admiral voiced her opinion on the matter. It was the quick glance behind her that she took to inform the kids of her caution that drew her startle; Nanoha, Sonic, Yuuno, Arf and Fate were nowhere to be seen in the room, "Kids?!"

Meanwhile, with the alarms and noises acting as their distraction, Sonic led Nanoha, Yuuno and Arf, who was carrying an unconscious and "broken" Fate through the halls of the massive warship. Perhaps it was by pure coincidence, or the fact that they were running in opposite directions that drew the group of five to intercept with the lone Chrono Harlaown. Both parties stopped in their tracks.

"Chrono-kun" Nanoha decided to avoid any thought of wasting time with any awkward pause and asked the enforcer of his directive, "Where are you going?"

"I'm going to head for the Garden of Time" Enforcer Chrono, already armed in his combat attire and passively holding his device in his right hand, informed quickly, catching the hint that time was of the essence, "I have to stop that mad woman before it's too late!"

"I'm going with you!" Nanoha said without missing a beat; her tone and emotion had indicated her honesty in the matter.

"Me too" Yuuno added

"Me three" Sonic added as well. Really, did anyone expect for him to sit out and let the mages hog all of the fun?

"All right!" Chrono agreed without so much of a second thought. It was almost a no-brainer to allow these three to tag along with him. Despite any thought of inexperience, they had shown full well that they could handle themselves in a fight. Not only that, but there was something about the blue hedgehog's tone that indicated that he was almost looking forward to the idea. The enforcer, frankly put, would've had to have been an idiot to spurn their assistance, and he certainly was not one.

"Arf" Yuuno glanced at the aforementioned wolf girl, "You stay here by Fate's side"

"R-right!" Arf had to pause for a moment to let the exchange sit in before agreeing.

"Let's go!" With that, Chrono took off in the direction that he was already heading in the first place.

"Right!" The trio of Sonic, Nanoha and Yuuno followed suit. If the blue hedgehog had any complaints, it was the fact that he had to slow himself down to a jog so that way the others could keep up with him. Although it was for good reason, as all of the speed in the world wouldn't help jack if he didn't know where he was going.

"Chrono, Nanoha-san, Sonic-kun, Yuuno-san!" Lindy called them through the communication channels as soon as she had figured out what the group was up to. Instead of trying to urge the group against such an act, she fully supported it. Sonic could've also sworn on his speed that he had heard some excitement in the admiral's tone, "I'm going to head on site as well! I'll trust you to handle the arrest of Precia Testarossa!"

"Hai!" Three of the human mages had agreed instantly to the woman's orders and expressed such with a quick answer. Sonic had agreed as well, but had a different way of expressing it.

"This calls for epic theme music!" The blue hedgehog declared, only for him to quickly lament upon it, "If only I didn't leave my CD player at home…"

The stage was set for the climactic battle. Both sides had their own motives to win and they had everything to gain or lose. Who would win?

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 14<br>The Time of the Sealing of Our Fates!**

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration L-Class Dimensional Cruise Vessel "Asura"]  
>[Medical bay]<br>[No BGM]**

Arf wasted no time in getting her mistress over to the medical bay of the vessel. For the wolf girl, it was still a bit of a mental toll to see her precious Fate in such a condition. Thankfully, while there were medical hands on call for Fate's aid, they respectfully stayed back so the familiar could be with her master alone.

At the moment, Fate appeared to be lying down on a hospital bed with a plain white bed sheet over her body. However, that was nowhere close to the girl's actual condition. If one were to put it into a few terms, the appropriate ones would range from "shell-shock" to "limbo". The girl's eyes were open, but there was little light or life in those crimson irises. Thankfully, the obvious sign that she was still alive physically was the fact that Arf was still alive.

That said the wolf girl was still torn with concern and worry as she looked at the young golden-blonde girl. With realistically little that she could do under her own power to help, Arf had decided to stand by her master until whatever befell her could pass.

Whatever Fate was under, it would've been greatly preferable that she got over it soon. From behind Arf there was a television screen that had displayed a live feed from a device. Whether it was by design or accident, the feed was specifically from either Raising Heart or S2U, as it displayed Sonic, Nanoha, Yuuno and Chrono inside the Garden of Time.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Garden of Time]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

A flash of lightning seemed oddly appropriate for the location that was the Garden of Time. It was during one of these strikes that the team of three mages plus one quippy hedgehog familiar touched down at the landing to Precia's lair. They wouldn't be able to go any further inside of the lair just yet as there was a detachment of the mad woman's robotic fleet of soldiers standing guard at the entrance. As the guard mechs were posted out there to make sure the mages would advance no further, there was little confidence that they could go on unmolested.

"There are a lot of them" Yuuno noted, the first to point of the plainly obvious fact that they were outnumbered.

"This is only the entrance" Chrono retorted as he held S2U close to him, "There are many more inside."

"Chrono-kun, what are they?" Nanoha couldn't help but voice a question to fill her curiosity

"They're machines that attack nearby targets" the enforcer replied

"I see, then there's nothing to worry about." The girl's pigtails seemed to twitch almost as if they could feel her optimism; a feeling that had her looking down toward her familiar for his input, "Ne, Sonic-kun?"

"Hai, hai; I just have to compare them to how Eggy makes his mechs; then I can have my fun" The blue hedgehog had taken the brief pause after the landing to stretch out his arms and legs a little in preparation for the upcoming big battle. It was only as he made to grip his twin kodachi from the sheathes on his back that he found Chrono's S2U barring his path

"Oy" the hedgehog had a small growl of annoyance, "What gives?"

**[BGM Insert: "Scrap Brain" Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis)]**

"There is no need to waste time on foes of this level" The enforcer said as he started to twirl the black and blue staff around. There was little doubt that he had done this sort of action before as his device chimed almost in sync to the enforcer's actions and thoughts.

"_**Stinger Blade!"**_ The device declared in a mechanical female voice. The head of the staff glowed a light blue that would represent the enforcer's magic color.

The young teen grunted a little as he threw a volley of blades generated by his magical energy. It was impressive that the volley of blades had taken out a whole wave of mechs before they could even react to the sudden display of hostility. What drew more of the semi-envious feelings was the speed in which Chrono had gotten the spells off.

"So fast!" Nanoha said in awe

"Hmph…" Was that jealousy in Sonic's tone? "I could've done that..."

"Snip shot!" The boy declared an incantation as he fired off another volley that took out the remainder of mechs. The only difference separating from the original wave of Stinger Blades was that this volley had much more speed behind it and took out the robots with one notable exception.

Chrono was barely fazed by the fact that the larger mech closest to the door had taken little damage from the Stinger Blade. It probably was almost to be expected, as the blades had lost power over time as they had impacted the mechs and ripped through them. No matter, the enforcer rushed through the wreckage and took a big leap out of the way as the mech tried to drive its axe down on him. From there, he used his momentum to land right on top of the robot's head and stabbed the head of S2U into it.

"_**Break Impulse"**_ S2U declared mechanically as the mech suddenly imploded as the result of a point blank spell. The action further shocked Nanoha and Yuuno speechless while the blue hedgehog grumbled some more.

"What are you doing standing there?" Chrono just had to pour metaphorical salt in the wound and criticize the trio for just standing there when they could've advanced; clearly the boy had a need to work on his social skills, "Let's go"

"H-hai" Nanoha and Yuuno had to pick up their pace in order to keep up with the impatient enforcer.

"Hai. Hai~…" Sonic said flatly as he followed suit, he made absolutely no attempt to restrain his quip for Chrono's impatience, "Chrono... the "ojou-sama" of impatience"

"Watch your mouth, familiar" They boy shot back as he led them through a hallway that had a good portion of ground crumbling away; revealing a very ominous void of pinkish and black. His tone never lost any of its informal sense as he sought to warn the three about the floor underneath them, "Watch your step as well."

"What do you mean?" Nanoha asked; though part of her mind had concluded that it had something to do with the holes in the ground, "You mean the holes in the ground?"

"More like the plane underneath the said holes" Chrono replied, "Yuuno, I trust you know what these holes are, right?"

"Complex Space" Yuuno replied as he matched stride with Nanoha and easily avoided the pitfalls, "Space where magic doesn't work"

"I assume that includes flying magic?" Sonic asked with maybe a slight uprising of his nerves upon seeing the inclining of the Tutorial Ferret and enforcer's heads. The blue hedgehog grumbled a little at that notion, he was easily annoyed over that idea, "Great… it's like Scrap Brain all over again"

"Scrap Brain?" Chrono asked in hopes that the blue hedgehog would elaborate.

"Eggman's big base on South Island" the hedgehog replied and drew upon his memory to add to the experience, "Scrap Brain, among a few other of the zones that Eggman had taken over, included these Bottomless Pit traps that made sense for speedy fellas like yours truly. Looooooooong way down!"

"How did you avoid them?" the enforcer instantly regretting asking such a stupid question. Why did he, of all people, had to fall for the idiot bait?

"Jumping?" Sonic countered the question with a half-question-half-answer of his own. His flat and exasperated expression drew a few giggles of amusement from Nanoha and Yuuno, "I'm pretty sure that was an obvious gimmick."

"You've made your point" the enforcer said with a slight tick of annoyance, "Moving on"

The group of four continued to make their way through the hall until they came to a set of large double-doors. Said doors were closed tightly, which probably meant that whatever or whoever was on the other side did not wish for the intruders to go any further. Chrono was going to have none of that; however, as he promptly kicked the doors open forwards.

They were once again greeted by more mechs. Much like the ones before, they had a severe advantage in numbers and had ranged from heavy-hitting bulky types to the swift aerial mechs. The blue hedgehog couldn't help but draw more similarities to the variety that Eggman's robots had back on South Island.

"We'll split up into groups of two from here" the enforcer declared and turned a half-glance over to Nanoha and Sonic, "You two go up to the top and seal the reactor."

"What about you, Chrono-kun?" Nanoha asked, not that she was going to disobey the enforcer's orders, but darn her if that curiosity of hers doesn't get her far.

"Ferret-boy and I will take on Precia and arrest her" Chrono answered without missing a beat, "That is my job after all"

"Oy, lay off the ferret jokes, those are mine to heckle Yuuno with" the resident familiar glared at the enforcer in annoyance, "I should start copyrighting that..."

"I don't think this is the time for that..." Yuuno said softly; though he had a feeling that he wasn't going to hear the end of the ferret jokes.

"At any rate, I'll make a path for you and your familiar. You better be ready to take off when I do" Chrono declared rather loudly as he started to prime up another big spell of his. This one involved him standing a fair distance from the mechs and pointing the head of S2U at them.

"_**Flier fin!"**_ Raising Heart declared as the familiar sight of pink wings appeared at Nanoha's feet. Sonic had answered in his own way by charging up his Super-Peel-Out dash. For him, it was rather a tossup between the Spin-Dash and the Peel-Out. At the moment, it was the advantage of freeing up his arms that led him to use the latter.

"_**Blaze Cannon!"**_ S2U declared as Chrono unleashed a powerful bombardment spell of flames from the device. The mechs had stood little chance and went down in a similar manner to bowling pins. A notion that Sonic had grumbled about as he noted that Chrono had labelled two Strikes before he and Nanoha could even throw a metaphorical frame.

"Chrono-kun!" Nanoha called back as she and Sonic used the Blaze Cannon as cover to ascend up the stairs, "Be careful"

"Heh!" Was that a smirk on the teen's face? That didn't sit too well with Sonic once again.

"Showoff" The hedgehog grumbled as he took the lead in front of his master; upon hearing the brunette giggle, he shot a pouty look in her direction, "What?"

"Nothing~" Nanoha giggled in youthful amusement at seeing her familiar express jealousy over the experienced and almost arrogant enforcer.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration L-class Dimensional Cruise Vessel "Asura"]  
>[Medical Bay]<br>[No BGM]**

While the drama at the Garden had occurred, Lindy had just left the v-berth after giving an order to her techs to set up a few barriers for defense against the dimensional tremor. All of this was watched by Arf in silence. Though she was hopeful that the mages deployed would stop the mad woman's plans, she had one more concern to deal with.

The wolf girl looked away from the screen to focus on Fate once more. There was no improvement to Fate's condition as the girl just laid there in the medical bed. Sure, all of her vitals and such indicated that she was fine in the physical aspect, and Arf could easily conclude that as well since she was still alive. It was the mental state of the poor girl that taken its toll and that was something Arf could do nothing about.

"I'm worried about those kids, so I'm going to help them out for a little while" The wolf girl was quick to explain her reasoning and justification as she leaned forward to talk to Fate. She had a feeling that she was probably talking to a wall, but that didn't stop her from speaking in such a hopeful manner. With that hope still with her, she softly placed a soft hand on the girl's cheek "I'll be back soon; and when everything is done, it won't matter how slowly it happens, but we'll bring you back to the real Fate that I loved so much; the gentle, kind Fate who saved my life.

"From now on, you're free to use all of the time you have" Arf had said her peace and stood up. Even though she had the feeling that she would've had better feedback talking to a wall, that didn't stop her from trying. The wolf girl slowly turned and walked away from the girl, only pausing once to give the girl one last glance before she left the room.

It was only a manner of seconds prior to Arf's departure that light and life returned to the crimson eyes of one Fate Testarossa. The girl still kept silent as she slowly took in her surroundings. It wasn't the first time that she had awoken in a hospital room; she had plenty of that back when she was just awakening at the Garden of Time. Her glance was drawn to the visual screen that had displayed the feed of the mages engaging her mother's forces.

**[BGM Insert: "Daijoubu da yo" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]**

'_Kaa-san never paid any attention to me, not even once.'_ Fate reflected upon her memories, finally accepting the grave truth that she had been oblivious to up until this point. Oblivious, or ignorance, it mattered little the cause; all that she wanted was to make Precia smile to her, but not once did it happen, _'It was Alicia that she missed, not me. I'm nothing but a failure to her. Maybe I should never have been born.'_

The girl glanced at the screen that had included her rival and Arf's counterpart of a familiar. Were the circumstances slightly different, she might've felt the amusement that Nanoha had in watching Sonic not only hold his own against the robots on the screen, but also make them look comically stupid with his childish, but effective antics. She had little reaction as she saw Arf, her own familiar, join up with the two.

'_Arf… and that girl…. What was her name again? She made sure that I knew…' _The blonde slowly sat up in her bed as if to watch with more interest. As she watched, the white-clad girl, the memories of their battles and rivalry came to her mind.

'_We fought again and again. I did some terrible things to her'_ In her memories, Fate was ever-so self-critical in the way that she treated the girl. And yet, there was an irony that confused her, _'And in spite of that, she spoke to me. She called me by name...'_

'_Again…'_ Fate glanced slightly away from the girl and felt tears roll down her face, _'And again… and again… and again…'_

The familiar flicker from the side of her bed drew Fate's glance further from the screen and toward the table. The familiar noise and glowing yellow light emanated from Bardiche. Without so much of a second thought, the girl walked over and held the device in her hand.

"Bardiche..." Fate spoke softly to the device, "My story. Our story. They haven't even begun yet."

The device, despite in its damaged condition, shifted to its scythe form minus the blade. It looked the worse for wear as it was cracked all over the frame, blade and shaft. With baited and short breath, Fate watched as the device tried to set itself back to Axe form. Bardiche seemed to represent Fate's own spirit as it did so.

"_**Get set." **_It took a lot of effort to do so, but the device had set itself back to Axe form. Its master broke down into tears once more.

"You've been at my side this whole time; haven't you, Bardiche?" Fate asked amidst her crying as, in somewhat of a dramatic fashion, one teardrop landed on the cold, hard, floor and made a resounding drip. Bardiche, the device that had the honor of being Fate's life-time partner and assistant in magic, had been with her the whole time and the girl could almost sense its feelings.

"You hate the idea of things ending like this too." The girl said, softly forming a question that probably did not need to be answered to her device, "Right?"

"_**Yes sir."**_ Perhaps it was the default tone of the male voice from Bardiche, but it almost sounded happy to stand by its master and serve her through thick and thin.

**[Song Insert: "Don't Be Long" Nana Mizuki]  
><strong>(Oh! There is an optional alternative for this song! It was in the original series. "Take a Shot" also by Nana Mizuki. I went with the former because it was awesome to listen to with the backdrop of the Nanoha movie. Purely optional for your preference)

If her small smile was of any indication, Fate seemed to gain strength from her device and held it much like she usually would. Her resolve had been steeled and her strength had been replenished. Cast aside, if only for the moment, were her doubts of confidence.

"I don't know if we'll be able to pull it off" The girl let her doubts and feelings show, but didn't allow them to drag her down this time, "But let's both give it our best!"

The girl focused a small fraction of her magic into Bardiche and mended the cracks. As the device seemed to represent her own will, Fate's resolve had also sealed up the cracks to her heart and body. In no time, the device's recovery was complete.

"_**Recovery complete!"**_ Bardiche declared.

"We haven't even lived our lives yet." Fate opened her eyes with that strong, revitalized resolve and watched as her familiar red and black cloak appeared and set itself upon her back and her body glowed a bright yellow as her Barrier Jacket clad itself over her body.

"So let's work to be true to ourselves" The girl said as she started to make the preparations to join the fight, "And end who we've been so far!"

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Garden of Time]  
>[Song Insert: "Don't Be Long" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

Meanwhile, Arf's joining of Sonic and Nanoha as they progressed up the Garden of Time to the reactor had made things a little bit easier. That wasn't to say that Sonic and Nanoha weren't capable of taking care of Precia's mechanical menace; they had little trouble on that front. once Sonic had got into his little "groove" that he seemed to only go into when dealing with robots.

For Nanoha, it was quite a sight to see her familiar so much into his own element. She couldn't help but feel that familiar had almost a talent for this sort of thing as she saw that Sonic's ways in taking out the robots were far from just his swords or the quills on his back. She couldn't help but giggle in joyful amusement as the blue hedgehog practically humiliated the robots with wits.

Heck when Arf had arrived, Sonic even went so far as to make it a contest out of the three to see how many they'd take out. There was nothing for the winner, well except bragging rights and pride, but that didn't stop them from drawing inspiration from the hedgehog's joyful excitement and rush of adrenaline.

"Oh, Sonic~" Arf chimed out to the blue hedgehog, "I've got 5 already!"

"I'm on 10" Sonic chimed back without missing a beat, he could already taste that pride on doubling up his wolf counterpart.

"Oh like hell am I going to let a spiny rodent outscore me!" That seemed to stroke Arf's ego enough for her to pick up the pace and immediately take on another wave of robots, "My pride will not allow it!"

"Nyahahaha~ gomen you two..." Nanoha giggled a bit in amusement in watching the familiars have their competition, but she honestly felt somewhat inspired, "But I've got 12"

"Oh C'mon!" Sonic pouted after taking out another mech. As he did so, however, his attention was drawn to another robot that had somehow escaped notice. To his shock and growing horror, the blue hedgehog had to watch as the robot had thrown its weapon at Nanoha's blindside; and there was little he could do to stop it, "Nanoha! HEADS UP!"

"Huh?" Nanoha turned and saw the massive weapon flying right for her and was far too late to react, except scream in shock, "Kyaaa!"

"_**Thunder Rage!"**_ Bardiche's loud declaration and the lightning-based stunner spell that immobilized the robot had clued the three to look upward at the arrival of the cavalry; a cavalry of one. From high above the group, Fate had positioned herself with the second stage of her spell ready to unleash upon the large mech.

"Thunder Rage!" Fate shouted out and stabbed the Glaive-form Bardiche into the center of her magical glyph. The second stage of her spell had begun to pour magical lightning down upon the massive robot and had destroyed it rather instantly.

"Fate!" Arf was taken by surprise to see her master.

"Talk about clutch!" The blue hedgehog let out a sigh of relief that he probably didn't even know that he held.

Fate slowly descended down until she was at eye level with Nanoha. Purplish-blues met and locked on to crimson reds as the two girls stared at one another. Fate had realized that she had probably saved her former-rival's life, but she knew, at least in her mind, that there was no equal to the debt that she owed the kind girl in white.

Their little moment of happiness and reunion had, much to the annoyance of a certain blue hedgehog, been interrupted once again. This time, the culprit was arguably one of the largest robots that anyone present had probably faced. That was especially true for Sonic, and considering his experience with robots, it wasn't saying too much, but it was something.

The robot itself was blue in color and was tall enough to take up a good portion of the Garden of Time's almost infinitely long stairway. It had a wide body build with huge, bulky arms. The shoulders of the robot had large pointed spikes from its shoulder blades and pointed lances for arms.

"No offense, Fate" Sonic started as he, with Arf right behind him, flew up until he was even with the two girls, drawing a quick glance from the aforementioned girl, "But your mother has way too much time on her hands if she's able to create this huge thing."

"It is a big one. Its defenses will be strong." Fate took no offense to the hedgehog's comment and probably would've agreed if any part of her personality would've made her jealous that her mother could make such a huge robot but have little time for her. But she wasn't, though and was more focused on the task at hand.

The large robot, regarding the four as hostile intruders, began to charge up energy at the tips of its arms for a powerful attack to eliminate said threats. While the attack would've been powerful, it would've been much more of a threat if it didn't take almost forever and a half to charge up. This gave Fate enough time to say what she had wanted to say.

"If we all work together…" The girl said softly and looked amongst her allies; looking to see for their feelings on the matter. She had expected Arf to be on board with the idea and wasn't surprised for her Familiar to grin in confirmation of that feeling. She next checked the blue hedgehog, though she had no clue as to what he'd think. The hedgehog had given her the thumbs up sign, so that could've been taken as agreement, but she also noticed that said thumb had also been pointed in the direction of Nanoha.

Fate had found herself fighting a bit of a blush when she saw the girl in white smile brightly and full of cheer. That excited look on Nanoha's face looked too cute for words to describe alone. Not so deep in the blonde's mind, she had made the note that if teaming up with the girl in white was going to draw this reaction more often; she'd definitely be up for it more often.

"Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!" Nanoha nodded repeatedly with each word she said. She truly felt almost to be in heaven, she was that happy. She had probably almost overloaded her familiar's emotional bond with pure happiness, but neither she nor her familiar would care about that. Since when was too much happiness a bad thing?

At any rate, the mechanical boss-like robot was not about to allow the warm and fuzziness to continue any longer. The energy gathered at the tips of the lance arms had reached its peak and it was soon about to fire it off at the group of four. Time was running out for the group to make a move.

"SCATTER!" Sonic shouted as soon as the robot fired its cannons. The group of four had split up just as the blasts hit the space where they were just at.

The attack was just the opening of what would be a volley of sorts as the robot had tried to shoot down the four targets in the air. The multitudes of shots had been effective in one manner; neither Sonic nor Arf were able to get close to the robot without the fear of being on the wrong end of powerful blasts. There was one thing that the four had known for sure. The robot would not be able to keep on firing forever and they would soon get their chance to go on the offensive. Nanoha, as much of the multi-tasker that she had become with magic, had that idea in mind when she prepared a four-round volley of Divine Shooter to be fired later.

Sure enough, the robot had to stop attacking to recharge its energy and that was when the four struck. Fate too the initiative and threw the compressed mana blade from Bardiche's Scythe form at it; impacting the robot's right shoulder with the large arm. Sonic followed suit with a combined sword-and-quill spin-dash attack and created a huge gash on the opposite shoulder. As massive as the robot was, the joints were the weak point, and Nanoha had sought to use that and aimed her Divine Shooter rounds at the joints. The robot must've caught on, as it used the big arm to intercept the spell. It did the same for Arf's volley of the Photon Lancer on the opposite arm.

Despite the effort of defense that the robot had put up, it was all for naught as the damage from Sonic and Fate's initial attacks had done their job and the backing from Arf and Nanoha's shooter spells had added extra pressure that was too much for the large arms and they fell down into the seemingly endless abyss below. The robot was not about to call it quits as there were four focus points left for it to draw energy from. The only differences were that these four points were smaller than the big arms, thus it would take a little bit longer to charge up.

"Bardiche! Arf!" Fate quickly called out to her device and familiar as she prepared to cast a powerful bombardment spell of her own to finish off the robot while it was still weakened.

"Raising Heart! Sonic-kun!" Nanoha followed suit with her own preparations. It would take the combined effort from both masters and familiars to take out this massive robot.

"_**Get set **_/ Yosh!" Bardiche and Arf both acknowledged in unison as the former shifted into the appropriate Glaive form while the latter had taken a position at the side of her master.

"_**Stand by, ready!**_ / Got it!" Raising Heart and Sonic equally chimed in unison as the former shifted to the appropriate Cannon form for bombardment spell while Sonic had taken his place by Nanoha's side.

"Thunder Smasher!" Fate and Arf shouted as they combined to unleash the powerful bombardment spell. Despite their combined effort, their spell still found itself blocked by a tough magical barrier that supported the defense of the robot. No matter, it was almost just like the demon tree from the park not too long ago.

"Divine Buster!" Nanoha and Sonic soon joined suit and unleashed their own powerful bombardment spell. Their spell was also met with the defenses of the robot, but they, like Fate and Arf, had kept full pressure on their respective spells.

"Here we go!" The four called out at the same time and added that extra "oomph" to their respective spells. In no time, the boss robot had been seeing pink and yellow as it was completely engulfed by the massive twin blasts.

Needless to say, there was little doubt in the fact that the boss robot had met its end. The four had not only destroyed it, but probably had enough overkill to wipe out any possibility of extended family. Plus; the Garden of Time had gained a rather sizable chain of holes as the bombardment blasts had ripped their way through the garden and into space. Any other circumstance and Sonic might've quipped to Fate about possible renovation projects to fix that hole in the future.

**["Don't Be Long" -ends- (No BGM)]**

There was a moment of silence that fell upon the four after the damage was done and the dust had settled. The only sounds that could've been heard were the output of exhaust from both Raising Heart and Bardiche from that combined bombardment attack. Both girls lowered their devices and gave their familiars a little moment to catch their breath after all of that.

"Fate-chan…" purplish blues met crimson reds again as Nanoha softly regarded Fate with a soft smile. Fate, in turn, responded with the small, cute smile of her own that, if she would've looked on hindsight, she could've sworn she saw a little flush of pink on the white-clad girl's cheeks.

Arf, after catching her breath, finally allowed herself to give into her emotions and tackled her master in an emotional, tear-filled hug. The wolf girl finally allowed herself to let her emotions out and cried her eyes out, caring little for how her tears were making her look or anything for that matter.

"Arf... I really worried you, didn't I?" Fate kindly and softly asked of her familiar. Her answer was a couple of tear-filled nods from the wolf girl. She didn't mind that, and instead just stroked her familiar's head.

With a warm feeling in her heart, Nanoha watched the tearful scene with a soft smile. She was caught up in the beauty of the scene and had almost missed her own familiar latching to her waist, because, well, why not? The girl made no attempt to push her little brother figure away and softly ran a gloved hand down the quills of his head.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Garden of Time: Caverns]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The rumblings from the combined Buster and Smasher spells from up above could've been felt easily from Precia's location, but then again, so could've the rumblings from the Dimensional Tremor. That didn't matter to the woman, however, as she gazed at the Jewel Seeds above the life pod that supposedly held her original daughter's body; rather that was what she had wanted to believe it did. Those reports from the Bureau about being unable to recover Alicia's original body were far truer than she had wished them to be. Nevertheless, even if this girl was supposedly another failure like Fate, and never be destined to see the light of day, the woman still needed something to hold on to.

"Just a little more…" Precia thought out loud. She was in for a rude shock when the rumbling suddenly halted. The woman grunted a bit and stepped back in fury, "That shouldn't have happened."

"Precia Testarossa" The voice of Admiral Lindy Harlaown had given the mad woman a rude awakening. The chain of events had started when Sonic and Nanoha had sealed the reactor of the Garden with Fate and Arf's help, "It's over; I'm suppressing the dimensional quake"

"The reactor has been sealed. My enforcer and our allies are heading for your position" Even as the Admiral had spoken from her position on the exterior of the Garden; with Durandal at her side and mana-generated fairy like wings sprouting form her back and a magical circle at her feet; her magic powers were at work. As the admiral worked and had reached out to Precia; Nanoha, Sonic, Arf and Fate were on their way to the old woman's location and would soon join Yuuno and Chrono there.

"The forgotten capital, Al-Hazard… the secrets that lie there..." Lindy made no attempt to hide the disappointment her tone when she addressed the older woman, "All of that should have been lost long ago!"

"You're wrong. Al-Hazard still exists" The woman was defiant in her motives. "The lost path to it should exist within the dimensional rift."

"Even if that were true…" Lindy asked as the tremor settled down under the combined efforts of her own power and the successful sealing of the reactor, "What will you do then?"

"I'll get her back." Precia replied, "I'll take back my Alicia's past and future. I'll take back everything that went wrong in this world"

If the woman had wished to say anything else on that matter, she didn't get the chance to as explosions generated from bombardment spells fired off from two distinct sources had interrupted her from doing so. The woman looked around to find that from one side, the enforcer Chrono and archeologist Yuuno Scrya had made their appearance, while on the other side, Nanoha, Sonic, Fate and Arf had made their appearances known.

"Don't act so naïve!" Chrono chose to say his small peace on the matter next, "No matter what spell you cast, you can't regain the past!"

"Lady, I'll let you in on a little secret." Sonic took his turn next as he regarded the woman with some contempt for her motives, "If I had my way, or my own little perfect world, I would've had my little blue tail in the sand, sunbathing at a beach of my home island and enjoying my Chili Dogs. Unfortunately, life happens…

"I didn't ask to become a familiar or to get involved in this magic thing, and I might've done things differently if I had a second chance, but if I did, what would've happened then? I probably wouldn't have gained a family and friends that love and support me." As Sonic spoke, Arf and Fate had taken that opportunity to get closer to the woman while still listening to the hedgehog.

"Yes, stuff happens in life that you will have little control over, but that is in the past. The past is meant to be behind you. Use the mistakes and the lessons you've made in the past to improve your here and now, as well as your future" Sonic looked to be finished with his peace and sought to deliver a little bit of a vocal uppercut before giving Fate her say, "You have a golden opportunity to do all of that; right here in front of you! You can start by actually giving a damn about the girl who spent the good part of these last few months trying to get a smile on that pitiful face of yours!"

Sonic had promptly shut his mouth after speaking his mind. It seemed to have gotten the job done as Precia hadn't said a word and instead just stood there and listened to the lengthy piece that even surprised the hedgehog's own master with the kind of wisdom he could've come up with at his young age.

Precia's eyes met Fate's as the two had seemed to just stare at one another for a brief moment of time. Sadly, the old woman was given yet another reminder of her slowly deteriorating condition in the form of another coughing fit that resulted in her sickly spewing blood onto the ground before she could cover her mouth.

"Kaa-san!" Rightfully so, Fate rushed to the woman in concern for her wellbeing

"What did you come here for?" Precia asked in such a weak manner that, had she not been close to death's door, her tone would've held more strength behind it, "Get out of my sight. I've already said that you were of no use to me; you're free to do whatever the hell you want."

**[BGM: "Daijobu da yo" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha MOVIE the 1****ST****]**

"I have something I want to say to you" Fate said her peace, unmolested and undeterred by doubt, "Maybe it's true that I'm just a failure and a fake. I'm sorry that I couldn't be Alicia Testarossa or live up to your expectations. If you want me to leave, I'll go someplace far away, but ever since you've made me, I've always wanted you… and I still do.

"I want to make you smile, kaa-san. If nothing else, my desire to make you happy is real." Fate went further to extend out her right hand in offering; shocking the older woman in front of her with her honesty and pure intentions, "Those are my real feelings; the feelings of Fate Testarossa."

"Pathetic…" was Precia's only spoken reply, and though she was truly touched by the girl's words, she felt that it was far too late for the sentiments. The woman tapped the bottom of her staff to the ground and activated another burst of magic.

The rumblings continued once more as the Garden of Time slowly began to crumble into pieces. This must've been Precia's final trump card for if the worst had happened and if she had failed. The Garden of Time's self-destruct sequence had begun, The quakes were so bad that it even shook Lindy around from her location and she had to abandon her post.

"This is bad! The Garden of Time is starting to crumble" Amy Limietta called out to all that could hear her, "Everyone! Get out of there before it's too late!"

"Hai!" Lindy was the first to acknowledge the directive and relayed the order a second time to Chrono and the others before she teleported herself out, "You heard the girl, everyone move!"

"Hai" Chrono was next to acknowledge the order and called out to Fate to get her attention, "Fate Testarossa! Fate!"

Fate didn't so much as move from her position as she watched her mother return to the life pod that held another failed copy of the original Alicia Testarossa. Had Fate had been paying any further attention; she might have noticed a flash of light blue appear at her side while Nanoha had stopped her flight just above the group.

"I'm going… I'm going with my Alicia..." Precia declared her intentions to stay behind; even if it was a false hope, she would still hope to cling to it until the very end, "I've already told you that I've..."

Thwack!

A sharp, but only concussive blow to the back of the old woman's head had knocked her unconscious before she could say anymore. Fate was taken by surprise when she missed the blue flash that was Sonic the Hedgehog run up to the woman and knocked her out with the hilt of one of his kodachi before sheathing it behind his back.

"Baka old hag…" the blue hedgehog grumbled as he hoisted the unconscious Precia over his back, wincing a little from the weight, "And a heavy one at that too."

Fate could only watch again as the blue hedgehog, Sonic, if she were to follow what the white-clad girl had said when she shouted his name earlier; carry her unconscious mother away from the life pod, which had soon sunk into Complex Space immediately following the hedgehog's leap.

"Sonic-kun!" Nanoha shouted out to her familiar as she had to fight Chrono and Yuuno from dragging her away, "We have to hurry!"

"Why?" Fate asked the blue hedgehog as he paused for a moment in his stride.

"Like I said; life happens" Sonic replied with a shrug of his free shoulder. This was yet another one of his whimsical moments that he would maybe entertain the thought of second-guessing much later in time; however his main focus was high-tailing the hell out of the Garden.

"I would be booking it right now if I were you" the hedgehog glanced upward at Fate. His joyful mood from before had taken almost a complete 180 and he was starting to feel his patience tested, "If you're waiting for a written invitation. I can easily knock you out and make my counterpart carry you."

"H-hai!" Fate did not want to take the latter option; her mother was most likely going to be okay and she could try to make amends with her later.

She and Sonic soon joined Arf, and with their speed proving to be a great help, they rejoined Nanoha and the others just as they were getting to the main hallway. It was then, however, that the self-destruction of the Garden of Time had seemed to escalate.

"Onegai, everyone!" Amy Limietta practically prayed out into the communication channels for the safety of the group there, "Hurry up and escape!

The destruction of the Garden of Time was imminent. Time was of the essence, and the group of four mages plus two familiars and one unconscious mage had less than minutes to waste in trying to escape from the crumbling lair. Would they be able to make it in time?

**[To be continued]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]<strong>

**[End of Chapter 14]**

Author's Notes: Another cliffhanger! Ain't I good at stumping people? Anyways, yes, I have completely made yet another original 180 and taken a completely different route in playing out a few canon scenes. There are a multitude of reasons I decided to keep Precia. For one, what justice would it really have given Fate if the woman was just killed off there? Nothing!

I know that canon Precia is dying of something, if I could guess it would probably be the final toll for all of those powerful spells she had been messing with finally taking their final toll on her body and life. However, if I didn't feel that I had a confident and legitimate way to keep that blasted woman alive, then I wouldn't have done so. I'm giving my canon Precia a chance of redemption. Plus, there are a few other things I will be dabbling in the future as well. However, I SHALL REVEAL NOTHING!

At any rate; as this is a major plot twist and the metaphorical penultimate event in the first of many arcs for this story, I'd really like some honest feedback on how I played this one out. Everything including the ultimate team-up of Nanoha and Fate, Sonic's own version of dishing out wisdom and his actions as well as how they mix up the results of this arc; please opine on it!


	15. Chapter 15

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter to Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar. Usual disclaimers apply

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Garden of Time]  
>[BGM: "Run!" Final Fantasy X Remaster OST]<strong>

"Everyone! Please get out of there!" Amy Limietta's voice couldn't be any more desperate or louder than it already was as the girl shouted through the communications, "The Garden could explode at any minute!"

Time was of the essence for the small group of the young mages as they tried to escape from the crumbling asteroid. For the most part, Nanoha, Yuuno, Chrono, Fate and Arf were uninhibited in their progress, but they didn't have to carry an unconscious Precia Testarossa on their shoulder. That honor belonged to the blue hedgehog, Sonic, who despite all of his speed, found the unconscious woman's weight to be more than just an annoyance.

"Chrono-kun" Nanoha, probably one to feel a little amusement over her familiar's situation if the circumstances weren't so dire; shouted up to the enforcer well ahead of her, "How much further do we have to go?"

"Our Admiral set up a transfer gate where we landed; we'll be able to escape with it." Chrono replied quickly; though he also sent a harsh glare back at the blue hedgehog in the process, "Assuming our rear straggler can still make it"

"Oy, oy! This lady's probably 3 times my size and probably twice my weight" the blue hedgehog shouted back as he struggled with the unconscious woman draped over his shoulder, "I'd like to anyone else try to carry her!"

"Why the hell did you pull that stunt anyway?" Chrono's annoyance over the blue hedgehog's actions outweighed any respect he had for him, "Our time here is precious enough and you had to waste more of it just to be a hero?"

"Oh, I'm sorry!" Sonic shot back in a tone that was definitely not one of remorse, "I suppose I should've just left the old lady die, is that right?"

"She was willing to accept her fate" The enforcer countered yet again, "That's why she set off the self-destruct mechanism in the first place"

"Umm..." Fate would've tried to restore order to the bickering boys, if only her voice didn't fail her. As she silently ran with worry evident in her face, she was taken by surprise when she felt the soft left hand of Nanoha's gripping her right. Confused, she glanced over at the white-clad girl.

"Don't worry, Fate-chan" The cute and confident smile of Nanoha's could've melt the hearts of anyone and if it wasn't enough, the optimistic tone of her voice had a positive effect as well, "They do this all the time"

"Okay..." Fate nodded and looked ahead down the familiar hall that was her home for some time.

"I see it!" Arf shouted as she caught sight of the entrance, where the active warp gate and escape was lying in wait for them all.

"Almost there" Yuuno added, trying to will as much speed as he could into his human legs; certainly no slouch in that department, but the speed was always spoiled by Sonic's.

It took just about every ounce of energy the escaping group had, but they were just able to reach the dimensional gate and warp out. Their timing couldn't be any better either, as the whole garden exploded into pieces just as the gate activated and spirited the group to a quick escape.

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 15<br>Call My Name**

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration L-Class Dimensional Cruise Vessel "Asura"]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

All was quiet on the bridge of the warship. The Garden of Time had just blown to bits and the only confirmed survivor so far was Lindy Harlaown and her only reason for that confirmation was due to her being the first to warp out and leave the open gate behind. No one could tell if the young group of mages out there had made it out just yet.

"The Garden has collapsed. Everything that was in it has fallen into Complex Space" one of the techs solemnly informed, "Furthermore, the dimensional disturbance has been prevented; and we have no indication of any dislocation outbreak."

"Understood" Lindy acknowledged, "And what about the recovery of our mages?"

"Confirming their recovery, starting with Enforcer Chrono" The other tech glanced at the screen, almost grinning in excitement as he saw apparently what he wanted to see, "We have them all!"

"Yokatta..." The woman let out a sigh in relief.

**[Medical Bay]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Within a few minutes of their safe extraction from the Garden of Time, Nanoha and Sonic found themselves in the medical bay. While their injuries were superficial and a little bit annoying at best, they still had to be tended to. The only thing that Sonic could find humorous was the fact that Chrono had to get bandages on his forehead thanks to some injuries that he sustained. Fate and Arf were also among those getting treatments to their injuries. There was one notably absent person, however, and Fate was rather concerned.

"Where's kaa-san?" Fate asked softly as her injuries were tended to by Arf

"She's in the brig" replied Chrono quickly.

"How is she?" the blonde followed up with another question.

"It was probably luck that she's still alive" the enforcer replied, rather oblivious to whatever shenanigans that Amy Limietta may or may not have been pulling with the bandage on his forehead as she wrapped it, "If we didn't get our medics to tend to her in time, she might've died. She should be fine in a few hours though."

"Good to know that my heroics won't go to waste" Sonic said, wincing a little as he felt his right shoulder getting wrapped up tightly in the bandages, "Ow, ow, ow!"

"However the damage she had done to herself was still extensive enough. The fact that she's alive is surprising." Chrono noted in observation. Noting the confused looks on the faces of Nanoha and Sonic, he elaborated, "The more powerful a spell, the higher the toll it takes on one's body. And the power doesn't just mean the output; it also applies to the range. The fact that she was able to cast bombardment spells across dimensions was taxing to her enough.

"There's also the accident" The boy added, "We don't know for sure what it did to her body."

"She's alive…" Fate stated the detail that was most important to her, "That's what matters to me."

"I'm afraid we can't let you see her when she wakes up" Chrono noted with regret, "As she is the prime suspect in this case; she'll be in isolation."

"But what about Fate-chan and Arf-san?" Nanoha asked, remembering the fact that the aforementioned duo were on the opposite side of the law for a time, "What'll happen to them?"

"They could be considered accomplices in the eyes of the Bureau, however given the evidence that we have; it could be argued that her actions were done under coercion" that said, Chrono didn't like saying the truth of the matter, "However, to do that; we'll be forcing Fate to relive some bad memories."

"They will do no such thing if I have anything to say about that" Lindy interjected as she entered the medical wing, "The Bureau should be satisfied enough that Precia Testarossa has been captured and will see justice for what she's done."

"We both know that won't be enough" Chrono noted as, to his subtle annoyance, Amy Limietta finished his bandage and tied a cute little bow at the end of it, "They won't be so lenient on her."

"I spoke with Leti Lowran, another Admiral and good friend" Lindy noted, "She said it'll take a few days to gather a ship and crew to come out here and pick up our suspects. I gave her the coordinates to the lunar orbit of Non-Administrated World #97"

"Eh?" Sonic and Nanoha stared at the admiral; apparently some parts of her statement went well over their heads.

"Sorry, I meant "Earth". I keep forgetting you two are locals" the woman chuckled a little in her own embarrassment, "At any rate; we'll have a maximum of 5 days to ready our suspects for transfer."

The group fell silent, allowing the gravity of what was said to sink in. There was a lot to go through for the next few days; but there would be time to worry about that later.

* * *

><p><strong>[3.5 days later]<br>[Dimensional Space (Earth's Lunar Orbit)]**

Time passed awfully slowly yet peacefully as things settled down after the raid on the Garden of Time. For Nanoha and Sonic, they spent the majority of it either in their cabin or out working on homework from Nanoha's school. They were able to spend some time with Fate and Arf, but not much and they weren't really able to socialize at all.

For Fate, she was relieved to hear that her mother had woken up and would probably be able to recover and live on for the most part. However that came with the strong "suggestion" against using magic, Precia's body might not be able to take another strain and she was only lucky to be alive after this long.

Speaking of the old woman; she sat in her cell for the most part. Even if she were allowed any visitors, she would've refused to see anyone; Fate especially; although the reasons now were not for contempt, but regret. The spell of regret was brought on by a memory with Alicia.

_**-Flashback: Appx 26+ years ago-  
>[Mid-Childa: Location unknown]<br>[Time: Unknown]  
>[No BGM]<strong>_

_The memory of the spring day was refreshed in Precia's mind. She remembered this quite well, it was the day she and Alicia had their picnic, and several days before the young girl's birthday. She could remember it all; the beautiful blue sky, the fields of grass in which they sat, and cute little Alicia's giggling when Precia gifted her that flower crown._

"_Alicia" Precia remembered the particular question she asked her daughter, "Is there something you want for your birthday present?"_

"_Hmmm…" the young girl adopted a cute thinking pose, but only for a mere second or two before coming up with her answer, "I know! I want a sister!"_

"_Huh?" a slight blush of embarrassment graced Precia's cheeks._

"_If I had a sister, I wouldn't be so lonely when you're out" Alicia must've put a lot of thought into it, because she had a few good reasons backing her, "And she'd be able to help you out a lot!"_

"_Well that's true, but…" Precia couldn't deny those facts, and despite the argument that could've been made; Alicia cut her off before it could be made._

"_I want a sister!" Alicia had mad her final answer, "Promise me, mama!"_

_Stunned, Precia watched as her young daughter extended out the pinky of her right hand, only doing so because her left hand had a sandwich in it, and wanted to make her mama give pinky swear on the promise. Fresh out of arguments and unwilling to break her young daughter's heart, Precia completed the pinky swear._

_**-Flashback end—**_

"I've always been this way…" Precia let out a defeated and depressed sigh as she seated herself on her bed in the brig, "Never noticing things until it's too late to do anything about them."

"At least you're saying something today" Admiral Lindy said as she entered the brig; almost making it a ritual to visit the woman. She had the clearance anyway, so there wasn't anyone to stop her. She also had the civility to smuggle in two mugs of freshly brewed (and sweetened) tea.

"You've been silent up until today" Lindy noted as she poured tea for her prisoner, adding little cream and milk until it was to Precia's preference. Taking a little bit of a bolder risk, the young admiral tried to urge the older woman to share her thoughts, "Care to share your thoughts?"

"I'm a fool" The older of the women lamented simply, and took her cup as she was offered.

"At least you're honest" the younger offered, earning nothing but a half-hearted smirk for her efforts, "What are you so foolish about?"

"I never realized what I had in front of me until it was too late to matter." Precia lamented regretfully, "And it cost me two daughters"

"Alicia and Fate?" Lindy asked, despite knowing full well who the older woman was referring to.

"When Alicia disappeared after that accident, it was only then when I realized just how much I neglected to give her the love and care that a mother should have done." The old woman hung her head, overcome with such regret, "And now with Fate. I mistreated her so badly… and it's only now that I remembered a promise I made to Alicia"

"What promise?" Lindy was slightly intrigued, she hadn't thought about looking too far back into the older woman's life prior to the accident, but there was only so much that records could do.

"I once took Alicia out on a picnic during one of my days off from the lab." Precia reflected once again on that day, tears slowly building up from her eyes in emotion, "Her birthday was coming up and I asked her what kind of present she wanted. The words she said haunt me with regret."

"What'd she ask for?" the young admiral slowly put the pieces together in her head; wondering what kind of a promise did Precia make to Alicia that would've been related to Fate.

"A sister" the woman replied, "She wanted a little sister; that way she wouldn't feel alone and I could have someone to help me out with work; freeing up more time to spend with them."

"And you're thinking that instead of treating Fate like a failed experiment you could've seen her as a second daughter?" Lindy started to fill in the blanks, "Like the younger sister that Alicia wanted?"

"Yes!" Precia almost shouted, tears rolling down her face in sorrow, "And it was my obsession with Alicia that clouded my mind from that fact! But I was so stupid… So foolish… so… so…"

"Calm yourself" Lindy, having her own share of experiences with distraught mothers; formerly being one herself as well when her late husband was killed years ago, sought to help relieve the older woman, "And drink your tea… it won't get any warmer."

Precia inhaled a deep breath and let it out in a sigh and sipped her tea down. She repeated the process for a minute or two until her cup was empty. Her emotions were allowed to settle down and she took another deep breath.

"I wish I could say that you'll get a second chance with Fate, but I can't be so confident. You have a lot of criminal charges awaiting you on Mid-Childa" Lindy could offer little relief, "A majority of these crimes are also felonies."

"If my understanding of the Bureau is correct, they'll see Fate and her familiar as my accomplices." Precia added, "What options do they have?"

"We have a strong case of coercion. We could argue that Fate wasn't a willing participant in your crime." Lindy noted, "But they'll have to testify to that in court; and that will force her to relive the methods of your coercion."

"She'll do no such thing; I'm the one the Bureau wants; I will be willing to take the responsibility for all that I've done" the old woman's tone was adamant and strong, "I've already put her through enough pain as it is. It wouldn't be right to force her to relive it again."

"We're agreed there, but my hands are tied" Lindy absolutely hated to say these things, but they couldn't be denied, "We could get her a suspended sentence or community service, but unless something comes up in which we'd need her aid in…and that's unlikely to come up because we're in the lunar orbit of a non-administrated planet."

"What about that odd familiar?" Precia had a thought or two occur to her, "The one belonging to that local girl?"

"Sonic?" the younger woman was confused, wondering where Precia was heading by suggesting said familiar, "I don't follow…"

"Despite being a familiar, he is a unique sort; none like what I've seen before" the older woman decided to have a little bit of fun and play the part of the cryptic seer, "He certainly can spark a little curiosity, am I right?"

"I'll think about it" Lindy calmly said and stood up to take her leave, "Same time tomorrow?"

"Let me know how it turns out" Precia requested to the departing admiral, "It may be too late for me, but Fate deserves a kind family"

Lindy nodded to that and left the older woman's quarters in the brig, musing a little about Precia selling herself a little bit short along the way. Perhaps she had known of the unpredictable nature of the recently mentioned blue hedgehog, but there was no way she could've predicted Sonic waiting for her right outside of the brig.

"Eh~" the hedgehog coolly winked at the taller woman as he leaned against the wall, "What's up doctress?"

"Alright" Lindy sighed, figuring the blue hedgehog was eavesdropping on her conversation with Precia, "How much did you hear?"

"Enough" Sonic admitted non-committedly with a shrug, "Humans are weird"

"And south islanders are not?" Lindy countered with a small smirk

"Touché" another shrug, "At any rate, did I hear something about you needing a reason to stick around earth?"

"Yeah, that way I can argue to the detachment that's picking up Precia that I'll need Fate's help on an incident" Lindy nodded in confirmation, "And no, I can't just make that call on my own; I'll need something that would force my hand."

"How about an urban legend?" the blue hedgehog offered with a little bit of a confident smirk, "I think I know a thing or two that may catch your interest"

"I'm going to need something a little bit more concrete than a legend." Lindy noted, "Even if it is from your home island."

"Well I just so happen to know about a particular planet that appears over a certain lake in South Island one month out of every year" the blue hedgehog smirked a little, "But it'll disappear without a trace for the rest of the year."

"Does Nanoha-san know about these urban legends?" Lindy couldn't help but wonder if this blue familiar had kept some secrets from his master; considering her brief experience with Nanoha, that wasn't likely to end too well.

"Eh, I tell her about them all the time" the blue hedgehog shrugged, "At any rate, this one's a little bit overdue to appear again."

"That could be a start" Lindy thought out loud, "If you'll follow me to my office, we can talk more about it and I can see how I can spin it to the others of the Bureau."

Sonic did not lose that smirk on his face as he trailed the other woman down to her office. For the most part, Lindy found the attempted sinister vibe of the hedgehog to be a little bit on the cute side more than anything else. They would spend the rest of the day plotting.

* * *

><p><strong>[The next day]<br>[BGM: "Spiran Scenery" Final Fantasy X Remaster OST]**

It was the day before the scheduled arrival of the ship to transport Precia to Mid-Childa to stand trial for her crimes. Fate was also slated to go as well, as she and Arf were accomplices, but there was no way that Lindy would, in good conscious, just let the young girl go through what could potentially be 6 months of court proceedings. The admiral was also just recently appointed by the Bureau to be the Fate's legal guardian, too; that was something she was going to inform Precia of later.

At the moment, she had decided to gather up the crew, including Sonic, Nanoha and Yuuno, and get a quick meeting to congratulate everyone on a job well done. The Jewel Seed incident, as far as any of the "action" was concerned, was dealt with and closed.

"There have been a great number of meritorious deeds involved with the conclusion of this incident." The woman stood up at her end of the long table and held a lone paper in her hand, "I'll have to summarize them for now, but I give them all my highest praise."

The admiral turned to face the aforementioned trio of kids and had to restrain herself from giggling in amusement. Nanoha was evidently nervous from the situation and that look she had on her face was cute in a humorous fashion. It was to more amusement that the aforementioned girl's familiar had an amused smirk on his face and a camera in his hand. Nevertheless, she glared the hedgehog into stowing said camera away, the fun time can wait.

"Takamachi Nanoha-san, Sonic the Hedgehog, Yuuno Scrya-kun" The woman calmly addressed the trio and presented Nanoha with a certificate of merit, "Thank you very much for your service."

Nanoha accepted the certificate with a bow. The resounding applause from the gathered crew had unnerved her, but she somehow kept her composure. Sonic, with that humorous camera incident aside, behaved himself. He could always wreak havoc another time after all.

* * *

><p><strong>[Mess Hall]<br>[No BGM]**

It was around lunch time for Nanoha and Sonic. The blue hedgehog managed to finally get his master to cave and allow him to enjoy his trademark favorite food; the Chili Dog. The reason Nanoha had allowed him was quite simple; Sonic earned it. Since her family took him in, they had to modify Sonic's diet. While it may have seemed a little unreasonable at first, the positive results they got on his overall health did more than justify such action. Since then, they only allowed him to eat his favorite food if he earned it; this was one of such occasions.

As the two were eating lunch, Lindy had surprised them both with Fate and Arf. As the admiral quickly explained; Fate wanted to talk with Nanoha about something and Lindy was kind enough to direct them to the mess hall before she went elsewhere.

"Fate-chan…" Nanoha smiled sweetly at the golden-blonde girl and watched as she took the seat opposite her.

Arf, figuring that she should give the two girls some space, went behind Sonic's chair and urged him to follow her. Sonic offered no resistance and merely followed the wolf girl away from their respective masters. The girls were going to need their time on this one.

**[BGM: "Suteki da ne? (Isn't it wonderful?)" Final Fantasy X OST]**

When the two were alone, they spent the good part of a minute or two gazing into one another's eyes before they snapped out of it at the same time and shared a giggle. The two shared a smile and almost seemed content with staring at each other's friendly faces before someone could break the silence.

"It's a little weird. There was so much I want to talk to you about.." Nanoha spoke first, admitting the funny feelings she was having whenever she passed Fate during this brief time on the ship, "But when I see your face, I forget it all"

"I…" Fate, for her own credit, fumbled a word or two as well, but she shared that feeling, "You're right, I can't get the right words out, either.

"Still," the blonde admitted, "I was glad"

"Eh?" Nanoha gave Fate a cute, confused look

"You were so honest with me" Fate elaborated a little and with a soft voice, but she was clear.

"Yeah, I thought it'd be nice to be friends with you!" Nanoha nodded with the cheerful smile, but found herself frowning a little in thought, "But you're leaving tomorrow…"

"I guess…" Fate answered without much commitment, she honestly was a little bit unsure of that. From her understanding, as an accomplice, she'd have to accompany her mother to the Bureau for some trial of sorts, but her temporary legal guardian, Lindy, was rather ambiguous, "I could be gone for a long time…"

"But we'll see each other again" Nanoha, a little saddened, asked; almost desperately so, "right?"

"It's a little sad" Fate answered the girl's question with a small nod, "but I think this will let me start being the real me.

"I asked Lindy-san to take me to you so that I can give you my answer" the blonde girl continued and went on to talk about why she wanted to talk to Nanoha in the first place, "The words you said to me before… You said you wanted to be friends."

"Yeah, yeah!" Nanoha rapidly nodded; always eager to make a new friend, and was especially driven to make one of Fate.

"I wanted to tell you…" Fate started to give her reply, fumbling a little with her nerves along the way, "If I'm able to… if you'll have me… But I don't know what I'm supposed to do

"So I want you to teach me." This was all rather new for Fate, she hasn't really had the chance to make friends before, and her memories, jumbled and whatnot as they were couldn't help her here, "What do you have to do to become friends?"

Nanoha gazed into Fate's eyes for a moment. From her own perspective she could guess that the blonde was honest, if a bit shy and inexperienced in her approach of trying to be her friend. The brunette simply smiled, knowing that she could make this work.

"It's easy." Nanoha simply replied, earning a curious glance from Fate, "Being someone's friend is really simple."

Their eyes met again as Fate gazed at the girl across from her. This girl had done so much for Fate and was so honest with her, it really touched her heart.

"You say their name. That's all you need at first" Nanoha went further, her joyful expression almost contagious and her smile could melt the hearts of so many, "If you want to be my friend; all you have to do is look me right in the eye and say my name.

"I'm Takamachi Nanoha" the girl introduced herself fully, "Call me Nanoha."

"Nanoha…" Fate said the name once; hoping she could get used to saying the kind girl's name.

"Yep!" Nanoha almost bounced off her seat in joy, "That's right!"

"Nanoha." Fate said it again, only faster

"Hai!" the brunette could only seem to get happier and really just wanted to get up out of her chair.

"Nanoha!" For the first time in Fate's life, she blonde had a big smile of her own and she stood up

"Yes!" Nanoha stood up from her seat and clasped both of her hands around one of Fate's. Her warm palms contrasting with Fate's slightly cool one.

"Nanoha…" Fate, standing up as well, gazed into the purplish-blue eyes of her new friend.

"Yeah!" Nanoha nodded again, seemingly addicted to hearing that soft voice of Fate's call her name.

"You have warm hands" the blonde enjoyed the feeling of the warm palms on her hand.

At that moment, Nanoha began to cry, though not out of sadness, but of happiness. She was so overjoyed and emotional; she had to wipe the tears from her face. Fate helped her with a soft stroke of her hand, wiping off the fresh tears from her new friend's face.

"I think I understand something now." Fate admitted with her soft smile, "When you're friends with someone, you feel just as sad as they do."

"Fate-chan!" Nanoha closed her eyes and embraced Fate in a warm, emotional hug. She just couldn't stop herself anymore. Fate didn't mind it at all; in fact she returned the hug and pulled the girl's head close to her chest.

"Thank you, Nanoha" Fate said, "If we part tomorrow, I'll be sure to see you again, and when we do, can I call you by your name again?"

Nanoha's only replies were the nods of her head. She couldn't find the words to say and just allowed herself to be caught up in the embrace of her new friend. There were tears rolling down her face, but she didn't care. She finally made a new friend; a friend that she can connect to and cherish.

"When I want to see you again, I'll call your name" Fate declared, tears rolling down her face to at a rapid pace, but she cared little, she was far too happy. Her eyes met Nanoha's again as the other girl tilted her head upward to listen further, "So call for me too

"When you find yourself in trouble" Fate made her final promise, and it was one that she felt would be appropriate considering what Nanoha had done for her, "I'll be the one to save you next"

No words were exchanged as the girls seemed to just lose themselves in their embrace. It was truly a heartwarming sight, one that they won't forget as long as they live. It was the start of their friendship, and it looked to be one that will grow over time. Nanoha was glad that she finally had done something right and Fate was glad that she had a new friend of her own.

Meanwhile, the two familiars may have been out of the way of their masters during their heartwarming exchange, but they weren't out of earshot. They could feel their masters' feelings for each other.

"Y-your master.." Arf had to wipe the tears from her eyes, "Nanoha is a really sweet girl. Fate's smiling so much; I've never seen her as happy before as she is now."

"I could say the same thing about Nanoha" Sonic sniffled a little bit, his eyes watering in joy, "This is the happiest I've seen her in the short time that I've known her.."

"You're crying as much as I am" the wolf girl, though tearful and appearing that she would break down herself, tried to get her counterpart to admit how affected he was by the scene, "Aren't you?"

"N-no way!" Sonic tried to play it off as cool as he could; don't cry; don't cry; do not cry, "It's just my um.. allergies.. or the onions from my chili dog.. or.. or."

"You're a poor liar; come here, you little softie!" Arf couldn't take much more and eventually broke down herself, taking her counterpart rather forcefully into an embrace. While the embrace of Nanoha and Fate was cute and heartwarming, Sonic and Arf's was a little more humorous but still on the cute side given the situation.

From outside of the door to the mess hall, Lindy had watched and recorded the whole exchange. Sure she was affected, as she had to wipe the tears from her face with a handkerchief, but she was mature enough to keep her composure fluid and finally made her way to the brig. A certain prisoner/guest /suspect of hers would have to see this.

* * *

><p><strong>[Brig]<br>[No BGM]**

"Precia…" Lindy once again greeted the woman as she entered the cell.

"Admiral.." the woman nodded in acknowledgement. She hadn't done much in the brief time since their past meeting. Then again there wasn't much to do with the exception of enjoying the food that was given to her.

"I think you'll be happy to know that Fate-san has made a new friend" the admiral went straight to her point, "It was quite a sight, really.."

"Was it the girl in white who tried to reach out to her?" the old woman asked, she didn't get Nanoha's name yet, so it was rather difficult to identify her.

"You guessed it" Lindy nodded in agreement, "Her name's Nanoha."

"Good… Fate will need all of the friends she can get" the old woman said, "And she'll be free to do as she wishes."

"You may think otherwise, but it's not too late" Lindy noted, trying to bring some optimism to the mother, "Fate's still young and I'm sure you can make amends with her if you try."

"She'll forgive me without a second thought" Precia noted that obvious fact, but her mood went sour quickly, "I don't deserve her kindness. I've put her through too much already."

"We'll see about that" the admiral said as she stood up to take her leave, "Oh, I wouldn't worry about Fate needing to go with you to Mid. I've got a few things planned out."

"Good, let's hope they work; I'm the one they want" the old woman's expression grew hard and serious, "I will not drag Fate down with me."

* * *

><p><strong>[The next day]<br>[No BGM]**

The day had finally arrived; the day that the transport ship from the Time-Space Administration would come in and gather Precia, Fate and Arf. The ship must've arrived early, as the alarms rang out through the Asura at just a few minutes past 6 in the morning.

Within the next 10 minutes the majority of the crew was able to shower up, change and prepare for the arrival of their guests. Among those who woke up, Lindy had managed to dress up in her usual uniform that displayed her high rank and arranged for Nanoha, Yuuno and Sonic to be present on the bridge with Fate, Arf and Precia. The former two were standing at attention and not under binding while the latter, Precia, had sported a pair of handcuffs, if only for protocol.

The dispatch team that was sent to pick up the trio was led by a light-purple haired woman in glasses and wearing a probably Bureau issued uniform. For the most part, she appeared rather calm about it all and was rather polite as she entered the bridge.

"Admiral Lindy Harlaown, everyone" The woman addressed her teal-haired counterpart in admiralty, "I am Admiral Leti Lowran from the Personnel Department. I am here to ensure the safe transfer of Precia Testarossa and her accomplices and see to it that they are taken to Mid-Childa to await their trial."

"I understand that and we will be glad to transfer Precia Testarossa into your custody" Lindy acknowledged such declaration but had a small grin on her face as she addressed a few last minute details, "However, she will be the only one you take today."

"Will she, now?" Leti had long held respect for her counterpart and some of the clever tricks she could come up with on the fly, "I seem to recall you calling me earlier this week and saying that I'll be able to take all three in their custody. Am I to assume that something has changed?"

"You would be correct" Lindy nodded, "It has recently come to my attention that there could be the presence of more Lost Logias on this planet; and with a good portion of my deployment crew either injured or soon to be re-assigned; I'll need the assistance of Fate Testarossa and her familiar in dealing with them."

"EH?!" Nanoha, Fate, Sonic, Arf and Yuuno almost fell to the ground in surprise. They were rather confused.

"Have you located any of them?" Leti asked, taking no issue with the fact that Lindy was well within her rights at the moment, so long as her statements held some form of corroboration, "You know that we won't be able to operate just on your hunch alone."

"Last night I had my crew run a scan of the planet in search of them" the woman answered as she held up a display screen of the geographical map of the Earth, specifically Japan and South Island. Lindy gestured to a multitude of dots around the South Island area; their signal was fuzzy and didn't hold enough information to track.

"We found inconsistent readings from these points right here" the woman gestured to the inconsistently flashing dots, "And the other one was solid blip that you see here"

"What do they indicate?" Lowran queried.

"At some point within this past year, small dimensional disturbances occurred. The flashing blips are inconsistent due to what we could only guess to be natural disturbances" Lindy replied, gesturing to the 6 blips that seemed to come from all over South Island.

"What about the one that we can see clearly?" the other admiral would've been lying if she said this didn't intrigue her, but she still kept her tone professional.

"From what I've been told, there have been rumors round that area of a mysterious planet that appears over that area. When we checked, it wasn't there at this time, though a source has told me that it's been slightly overdue." Lindy explained that area rather clearly, "The problem is, no one knows much about how it works or anything for that matter; no one, including my source, has been able to get up there to check out themselves."

"Who's this source of yours?" the rather inevitable question from Lowran came; given what her counterpart was trying to argue, the last thing that she wanted was for her to come up just short.

"That would be me" Sonic stepped forward, much to everyone's surprise, "Sonic the Hedgehog"

"You're a familiar" Lowran noted that detail right away, "You'll have to understand if we can't take it for that much face value."

"True, but I was only just recently made a familiar as this whole incident thing started" the blue hedgehog was somewhat annoyed, but understood the reasoning behind the question, "I've seen this planet myself. It comes up over this lake on my island for a month and then it disappears for the rest of the year. I haven't been able to check it out because at the time I didn't have any way to fly up there and most of my travelling was done on the ground."

"It is my understanding that if this "planet" is somehow able to travel between dimensions" Lindy noted informatively and coherently for all to hear, "We could be dealing with a powerful Lost Logia. This type of artefact could garner unfriendly interest; and I think we should check it out to make sure it doesn't fall into the wrong hands."

"You are well aware of the risks your taking here, Harlaown" Leti levelled a stern look at her counterpart; guessing that the other reason for keeping Fate was to keep her away from a the drama of a trial. "If this girl does anything that compromises the Bureau in a negative light, you will be held responsible, and the girl will be brought back to Mid-Childa for her trial,"

"I am willing to take that chance" Lindy answered just as sternly.

"Then consider the request granted. You can keep Fate-san and her familiar here" Lowran answered quickly if only for the formalities. She knew how good of a mage her counterpart was, and also knew how driven she can be at times. Still the other admiral was more than willing to count her losses, not that they were significant.

"Precia Testarossa will be heading for Mid-Childa then. The legal proceedings shouldn't take too long and the testimony of Fate-san won't be needed with all of the evidence we've got already" Lowran noted and motioned for her mages to take Precia, "Thank you very much for your cooperation."

"Kaa-san!" Fate tried to get a word or two with her mother in before they were to part. The other mages seemed to be sympathetic enough to halt their advance to allow for the blonde to catch up.

"Fate…" Precia let out another sigh and knelt down to be at eye level with her artificial cloned daughter, "I am sorry, but you can't help me out here this time. Your kaa-san has to answer for the wicked that she's done.

"I don't think there's much hope for me" the woman noted, "But if fortune is on my side and my sentence is lenient, perhaps I can make amends with you. But right now, you have other friends to protect, do you not?"

"H-hai!" Fate could barely restrain the tears in her face as she nodded and clung to her new friend's side, "I'll protect her!"

Precia could only manage a small upward curve of her lips at the display. She then turned and allowed the other mages to escort her away; led by their admiral. The departure of the visitors was marked only by the noises of the alarms through the bridge, but even then it all went silent afterwards.

"Well…" Nanoha turned to face Fate, completely taken by surprise from the turn of events, "That was unexpected"

"It was.." Fate nodded, seemingly confused by it all, but at least she had resolved one issue, "Now I know I won't be leaving you anytime soon."

"Wow…" Sonic let out a huge, dramatic sigh of relief, "I had no idea it would work that well."

"Wait" Yuuno interjected, "You planned this?"

"He and I did a few nights ago" Lindy explained; her expression rather neutral, "As it turns out; our work here on this world is not finished just yet."

"What are we to be expecting?" Chrono asked, rather perplexed himself but still kept his professional cool.

"Apparently it's a small asteroid that appears over a specific lake in the islands where Sonic hails from" Lindy explained, "If this is true, then we best be prepared to check it out."

"What should we do before then?" Nanoha asked.

"For the moment we'll head down to the earth, Nanoha and Sonic might be missed by their family so it'll be for the best that we all go down there and let them know they're fine." the woman replied, "From there, we'll spend as much time as we can blending in with the locals, and preparing ourselves; but when this planet appears, we'll be ready"

"Fate-chan, we can use the time we have to get to know each other better" Nanoha cheerfully told her new friend.

"I can't wait.." Fate smiled softly in return.

"I'll be ready for anything that comes my way" Arf gave a fanged grin in excitement; she apparently had renewed vigor and excitement flowing through her and it felt good.

"Story of our lives huh…" Sonic chuckled a little at the irony he was about to point out, "The end of one adventure and the start of a new one."

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step]**

**[End of chapter 15]**

* * *

><p>Author's Notes: Only 7k words? That's a struggle.. XD.. just kidding. The episode this was based on had a lot of unnecessary stuff that I didn't really feel important enough to bring in.. Well. That's all on this arc folks! This doesn't mean the story's over however.. I wonder what urban legend Sonic's speaking of. For the Sonic fans, you probably already know what this is, but feel free to guess and review. And I don't care who anyone here is, the NanoFate friendship scene… it was just heartwarming to watch in the movie and anime.. I'm still full of tears and I'm WRITING this story… Anyways, review please! Let me know what you think.<p> 


	16. Chapter 16

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter to Lyrical Familiar. Well, this chapter will serve as sort of an intermission between the two arcs. The Little Planet arc will start with Palmtree Panic next chapter, but for now; let's have some fun.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Undisclosed Location]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Plotting, that's what Doctor Eggman was doing. He certainly didn't spend the past few months crying like a little baby over the destruction of his toys on South Island. No, that teddy bear next to his chair was definitely not his. He just stole it from some kid way back when, though it did have his name written in marker and the ink was so old it was barely visible. Yes, esteemed scientist Doctor Eggman was most certainly not crying; he was plotting.

"I can't believe my robots were so easily destroyed!" The mad scientist ranted to no one in particular, perhaps a habit of his that never was curbed, "And by a little rodent no less!"

The doctor stared angrily at the display of the monitors from his computer. The object in display was the same blue hedgehog, Sonic, that had single-handedly destroyed his base. The footage was taken from what was left of his robots and the cameras he had placed around to alert him of any resistance. The footage was analyzed not only on the visual standpoint, but also from a statistical standpoint. The computer monitors displayed some of the data that said computer was able to calculate; height, body weight, mass. Those stats were then compared to the data taken from the battle; and the inconsistencies frustrated the scientist to no end.

"It's statistically impossible! How is that rodent capable of such speed?" The doctor ranted, "There's no way that someone of such short size and weight is capable of the damage he's done!"

Eggman had gotten that sense of déjà vu but shrugged it off rather quickly. He knew full well that he had already gone through that rant or similar variations of it many times since his defeat. It troubled him even more that the data he could gather wasn't enough to use towards improving his robots to counter such speed. He spent the past few weeks improving what he could, however, but aside from the overall defense and armor; it wasn't much. He still hadn't gotten an answer for the speed factor.

"I have more than enough robots to launch a second raid on South Island, but they won't get me far unless I can find an answer to that rodent's speed" The doctor grumbled in his little monologue phase, "I can't negate it, but if I could find something to match his speed."

A loud alert from another computer screen pulled Doctor Eggman from his thoughts. He had programmed his alarm system to alert him of many scenarios: intrusions, attacks, schedule alerts, etc. In the current case, as there were no signs that his hidden base was intruded upon, it had to have been a schedule of his own design.

"What's this…?" The mad scientist glanced at the screen. A sinister grin appeared on his face as he must have seen something he wanted, "Yes… it is getting to that time, isn't it?

"It's been almost a year since Little Planet had appeared. This is just perfect" Eggman chuckled darkly as a plot of his own had quickly started to develop, "This time I'm prepared for it too. And if my calculations are correct; not even that pesky hedgehog will be able to stop me this time!

"Once again the world will know the true evil that is Doctor Eggman!" Said doctor shouted so loud that he could hear his own voice echoing throughout his lair, "O~ ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! O~ ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! O~ ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho!"

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 16<br>Prelude to Little Planet**

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Residential District, Takamachi Residence]  
>[Local Time: 0845 am]<br>[BGM: "Spiran Scenery" Final Fantasy X Remaster OST]**

Only an hour or so had passed since the detachment of mages sent from the TSAB had picked up Precia Testarossa. All of them were in civilian clothes; Nanoha had worn a reddish long-sleeve shirt underneath a pink and white t-shirt, purplish-pink skirt, long white socks and brown shoes with only a slight heel to them. Fate sported a black t-shirt and skirt combo with boots almost a quarter of the way up her calf.

While their clothes were civil and not too much to note, the fact that the two girls had traded hair ties was of note. Nanoha had tied her hair into pigtails with Fate's signature black hair ties while Fate had Nanoha's white ones. They had agreed to trade earlier as a sign to show their friendship, of course both girls, Fate especially, were shy about it.

Lindy had taken that time to set out a plan for the day before deciding to head out. It was planned so the woman would drop off Nanoha, Yuuno, Sonic along with Fate and Arf at the Takamachi residence while she, Chrono and Amy could spend a good half of the day hunting for a house that would be suitable for their needs. If any positive results came up, they'd jump on it quickly, but otherwise they'll keep looking until they could break for lunch.

"Achoo!" A certain blue hedgehog familiar sneezed and brought his gloved finger to wipe off his nose.

"Bless you" Nanoha helped her familiar's efforts by giving him a small tissue.

"Thanks" Sonic gratefully received such piece of paper and cleaned out his nose of any possible offending germs, "That came out of nowhere."

"A sneeze is usually a sign that someone's talking about you behind your back." Fate noted in some explanatory manner. She quickly sported an adorable blush in shyness when her innocent remark earned a curious glance or two, "S-so I read…"

"Anyways…" Lindy cleared her throat a little to draw attention away from the flustered blonde and back to the plan set for the day, "Everyone here knows the plan, right?"

"We... as in me, Nanoha, Arf, Fate and Tutorial Ferret, get dropped off here to visit with Nanoha's family" Sonic listed out the specifics of said plan, "While you three go out house hunting for a base?"

"Hai" Chrono confirmed, "Preferably one close to this house. It will be much more convenient than having to warp back and forth to the Asura."

"Nanoha?" Lindy addressed the aforementioned brunette, getting a quick nod in reply, "Did you call your family ahead of time?"

"Hai, I called less than a few minutes ago when we arrived" Nanoha nodded in confirmation to the woman's question, "We are expected, and I think Alisa-chan and Suzuka-chan are here too."

"I think Alisa was the one who helped me when I was injured." Arf noted in memory, "I'll make sure to thank her."

"I hope they'll like me…" Fate admitted softly in her nervous state, "I didn't make a good first impression with them…"

"Daijobu, Fate-chan!" Nanoha cheerfully grabbed Fate's hand in hers; eliciting yet another adorable pinkness of said blonde's cheeks, "Alisa-chan and Suzuka-chan are really nice, you'll get along fine."

* * *

><p><strong>[Inside the house]<br>[BGM: "Spiran Scenery" Final Fantasy X Remaster OST]**

Momoko had busied herself with washing the dishes with her older daughter helping out while Shiro and Kyouya were watching television by the couch with Alisa and Suzuka. They were eagerly waiting for Nanoha and Sonic to come through the front door at any time, and they were going to welcome them back with open arms.

For them all, it was a relief to hear that Nanoha was going to return to them safe and sound. They were all quite worried, especially when the Uminari was blindsided by a chain of quakes. It was a scary day for everyone. The quakes felt so severe and dangerous; they inspired even more fear with the fact that Sonic and Nanoha were out there. It was only the optimism of Alisa and Suzuka had in confidence of their best friend that kept everyone from assuming the worst.

The sounds of the door opening and a soft patter of footsteps drew the attention of them all. It looked like their fears were about to be put to ease finally. Still, they waited until they heard the cheerful voices of the two first before acting.

"We're home!" Nanoha and Sonic called out as they entered.

The two didn't get much further through the door before they were tackled by blurs of purple and dirty-blonde. Nanoha barely had enough time to brace herself when Alisa tackled her to the wall. Sonic was not immune to such either as he had Suzuka to tend with. They could feel the tears from both girls on their chests.

Not ones to interrupt such a moment, Lindy, Amy and Chrono waited patiently at the doorway. Fate, recognizing the two quickly, took refuge behind the leg of Arf's human form in shyness. Arf, for the most part, took the scene in stride, though she had understood the feelings of the tackling duo. Lastly, Yuuno, who took to his ferret form as it was the form Nanoha's family recognized first, actually hid behind Arf as well. His reasons were understood by Arf, but she would hold no mercy as it was the ferret's own fault.

"Idiots" Alisa said in between her tears as she relaxed her grip and released Nanoha from it, though she still had a stern glare for said brunette, "You're both idiots."

"We were so worried about you" Suzuka added as she followed suit with her dirty-blonde friend, "We almost thought you weren't going to make it"

"Sorry" Nanoha apologized while her familiar, having little to say, opted to let her do the talking, "We're really sorry for making you worry about us."

"While you guys were out, the whole city was hit by earthquakes" Shiro said as he, with his wife, and older children following suit, walked toward the group at the door, "No one we've talked to could explain it."

"We can" Lindy spoke up, "But I don't think your front door is the best place to talk about it"

The woman's words rang true as the family and friends were so caught up in welcoming Nanoha and Sonic that they didn't give them the chance to enter the house all the way. A rather humorous point at that, but true, everyone was allowed to go in; fully revealing all of the guests that were with the two.

Fate, despite her best efforts of hiding behind Arf in her shyness, was still found out quite quickly, mainly because of the familiar she was hiding behind. It was only a matter of time before someone would notice her. With that in mind, she stood beside Arf and put on about as best of a polite manner that she could despite her shy demeanor.

"Ara, I know you" Sure enough, it was Alisa who noticed her first and made the comment, "Weren't you the one who knocked out Nanoha-chan during that one time?"

"H-hai" Fate wasn't able to deny it, nor could she fight the regretful look on her face and she found herself staring at her shoes, "I'm sorry"

"Alisa-chan, we're friends now" Nanoha sent a serious look at the dirty-blonde, sending the key message to back off. Satisfied with her result, she sent a confident smile at Fate, "It's okay, Fate-chan, introduce yourself."

"I'm Fate… Fate Testarossa." Said blonde had a slight dip of her head in a polite bow, her face sporting a cute shade of pink in her shy blush, "I'm sorry for putting you all through so much trouble directly or indirectly with my actions. I hope you'll come to forgive me and that we can get along."

Once again Fate was the subject of a majority of everyone's gaze. Nanoha's family, along with Alisa and Suzuka, glanced at the blonde with a neutral, almost analytical, gaze. It unnerved Fate a little and she found herself withdrawing back a little, especially as Alisa approached her first.

"Hmmm…" Alisa looked over the blonde girl, analyzing her a little. It didn't take her long to end such analysis; the fact that Fate looked so cute when she was shy helped in that. The dirty-blonde had a small smirk, "You pass"

"Huh?" Fate was completely confused, "Pass?"

"She means that you're going to be our friend" Suzuka walked over and placed her hand on the dirty-blonde's shoulders, eliciting a comical shiver from her, "And you're going to behave; ne Alisa-chan?"

"H-hai…" Alisa let out a comical gulp as she was pulled back a ways.

"Fate-san's familiar, Arf, is the tall one right next to her" Lindy noted, pointing out the silent wolf girl familiar. She then saw fir to introduce the others with her in respective order, "Chrono here is my son and one of the enforcers we have on call. Amy Limietta is our information specialist."

"Pleasure to meet your acquaintance," Chrono bowed formally.

"Nice to meet you guys as well." Amy followed suit, "And don't mind Chrono-kun too much, he can be a real brat sometimes."

"I am not going to comment on that," The boy kept true to his word and instead brought up a little concept that bugged him, "We're getting off topic here"

"He's right" Lindy noted in agreement and glanced at the others, "We were about to discuss the quakes?"

"Yeah they were so sudden and most of us were scared" Miyuki reflected on that day, she was training in the dojo with Kyouya and her father when the quake struck, "It started almost mid-day and it lasted more than just a few minutes."

"That was a dimensional quake" Lindy noted, she had the authority to explain a few things, but not all as the Bureau still had to run through a few specifics, "They were caused by a chain reaction that included the simultaneous activation of multiple Jewel Seeds."

"We have a suspect in custody and en route to our main base to be tried" Chrono added, "But that's all we can say for now"

"And Fate-san?" Shiro questioned, curious as to the circumstances regarding his daughter's new friend.

"Technically, she's an accomplice, along with her familiar." Lindy noted, "However, due to recent circumstances, I've managed to arrange for her to be a contractee mage to assist us in an upcoming case."

"Are we allowed to hear about this one?" Shiro asked, somewhat skeptical, though he had good reason for such feelings.

"Yes because this world is going to be directly involved" Lindy affirmed, but she wasn't below a mischievous streak of her own, "However I'm not going to tell you just yet. I'm a bit behind schedule with the preparations that I still have to make while we're here."

"The first includes getting a house in the city" Amy noted, breaking her silence, "It will serve as our little "base" planet-side"

"And we'll be leaving Fate-san and Arf-san here while we're out" The admiral added, "We won't be out for too long and if needed, Nanoha-san knows my cell number.

"You might want to ask Sonic about this one as well" Lindy was kind enough to leave a little hint while she was taking her leave with Amy and Chrono in tow, "He was the one who brought this to my attention"

With an amused look on her face, the admiral took her leave. As she did, everyone else levelled a glance at the aforementioned blue hedgehog. Sonic could barely react as he found himself tossed right into the fire. It was duly noted to him that amongst those staring at him, Fate and Arf were probably the most curious.

"Traitor…" Sonic grumbled a bit about being tossed to the metaphorical lions' den; though there was little malice in his tone and he let out a sigh of defeat, "Alright, ever heard of Little Planet?"

* * *

><p><strong>[With Lindy, Amy and Chrono]<br>[No BGM]**

"Admiral" Chrono addressed his mother rather formally, but appropriately so as they were on the clock, "Can I ask a question?"

"You just did" Lindy remarked in amusement, drawing a giggle from her intelligence officer and a groan from her son, "At any rate, go ahead."

"Why are we putting so much trust in this blue hedgehog?" The teen queried in his poorly-hidden skepticism.

"Are you questioning this because of Sonic's status as a familiar?" Lindy levelled a questioning look to counter her son's skeptical one. She'll give an answer to her son's question, but she'd prefer to discern the reasoning behind it first.

"Partly" Chrono admitted, "But he's been secretive and guarding. Don't you find it a little bit odd that he neglected to inform you of this until it became convenient for him to do so?"

"Not really, he admitted that this was a stretch to begin with and we were lucky that Admiral Leti gave us the green light" Lindy noted, "And if you hear Sonic's story, you'll be more understanding of his reluctance."

"You're referring to the islands he hails from?" Amy offered, "From the intelligence that I could gather, the islands were under attack by a scientist out for world conquest or something."

"Doctor Eggman" the admiral confirmed, "His actions have painted a negative light for how the others of South Island regard us humans. I would argue that it was Nanoha's drive of reaching out to him that kept Sonic from following down that same path."

"If the rumors of this Little Planet are true, what are we going to do?" the teen enforcer asked, "If it's as big as this hedgehog says, we'll have a tough time sealing it."

"I'll send a small team to investigate" Lindy noted with a knowing grin on her face.

"You're going to send the girls and their familiars out there" Chrono easily could've seen the plotting of his mother at work.

"What better way to test their skills?" the admiral had every right to feel confident about her plotting; she sent a teasing look to her son, "Don't you worry about being left out; you'll be kept on reserve should they need it."

"I didn't…" Chrono was about to argue to the contrary of that statement but failed as he couldn't come up with anything, "How did you know?"

"I know you" was the only statement that the admiral needed to reply with.

"Oh! Found one!" Amy changed the topic when she found a modest little two story house close to the Midori-ya café; it just so happened to be on sale and at a reasonable price.

"Let's check it out" The admiral led her intelligence officer and assistant inside, leaving a rather silent Chrono behind.

"I need to stop being so readable" Chrono let out a defeated sigh and followed his mother and Amy inside.

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence]<br>[No BGM]**

A brief silence fell over those in the household as Sonic had finished explaining what he could about Little Planet. He could honestly offer no more to them than what he could offer the admiral on the Asura.

For the most part, the family took it all easily. Shiro was stoic to take it all in stride as was his wife, they had grown to trust the blue hedgehog and be patient with him. The same was said for Miyuki and Kyouya. Nanoha, having heard plenty of the urban legends and rumors from her familiar himself, felt happy that he was starting to trust people more.

It surprised Fate and Arf at how the Bureau was so quick to work with it, but they were still grateful that the hedgehog went so far for them. There was little doubt that the two would probably need to have a word with Sonic and Nanoha later on if the chance arrives.

As for Alisa and Suzuka, they were honestly just glad that Nanoha and Sonic weren't trying to keep secrets from them. Sure, it was to all sorts of frustration that they wouldn't be able to help them, but if they could support them from the sidelines, that was just fine.

"Do you have any idea what you could face out there?" Shiro queried, "Objects of power or importance can easily draw attention from the wrong kind of people."

"I can name one already" Sonic noted rather instantly, "Eggman"

"That man used to be highly respected in the field of science and technology" Momoko noted in some understanding, "It's honestly quite scary; thinking about what the loss of sanity, even for a moment, could do to a genius mind."

"H-hai…" Fate was the first to affirm to that, cringing a little in phantom pain. Luckily for her, Arf had opted to sit next to her. She leaned into her familiar's side to find comfort.

Fate's actions drew looks from the majority of those in the living room. Respectfully, however, the family chose not to comment on such, noticing the way the girl had acted. Alisa and Suzuka looked like they had something to ask in curiosity, but they kept quiet when Nanoha and Sonic sent them a combined "leave it" look.

"At any rate" Shiro decided that a change of topic was in order as he turned his attention to Fate, "Fate-san, do you have a place to stay?"

"Lindy-san's my legal guardian; I think I'm going to stay with her for now" Fate replied softly, "Why do you ask?"

"Our guest room is open" the father figure of the Takamachi residence offered, "You can stay for the night if Lindy-san can't find a house"

"Oh, um... n-no, it's fine" Fate tried to be as polite as she could be in declining the offer. Her shyness had a majority of those present trying hard to keep control "I don't wish to burden you"

"You'll be fine" Momoko encouraged, "Besides, think of this as an opportunity to get to know Nanoha-chan more."

"I don't know if Lindy-san would approve" The blonde fought off the increasing blush of her shyness at the thoughts of sleeping over with her new friend could bring, "I'll have to talk to her"

"We're back" Speaking of the devil, Lindy, flanked with Amy and Chrono, entered the living room. The woman looked to be the bearer of good news.

"That was quick" Even Sonic was surprised by how fast it went

"We were only looking for a place to suit our needs." Chrono noted as if there wasn't much to the feat, "It's not like we were planning on staying on this world long-term."

"Chrono-kun, be nice" Amy Limietta scolded the bratty enforcer.

"At any rate" Shiro felt the need to get everyone back on topic, "Admiral?"

"Yeah?" Lindy replied

"Would you mind if Fate-san and Arf stay the night here?" the man asked, "I was originally going to offer her our guest room should your party be unable to acquire a house."

"That works out better for us actually" the woman agreed quite quickly, and she was easily able to explain her reasoning behind it, "We still have some of Fate-san's things on the Asura; we'll need some time to move them to her new room in our house, so until then, she'll be free to stay over here."

"Why not make it a sleepover?" Sonic innocently offered; wincing a little as he found himself in the center of attention, "What?"

"That could work" Momoko noted

"It'll give us more time to move Fate's belongings to her room" Lindy added.

"Ano…" Poor Fate looked so awkward in being the topic of discussion once again, "Is this really okay?"

"I don't see anything wrong with it" Shiro shrugged a little.

"A sleepover is a great way for new friends to get to know each other better" Nanoha added

"Sonic-kun, you're a genius!" Alisa had an excited grin that, if anyone were to look closer, they would've noticed the mischievous auras she had as she thought of the fun she could have at a sleepover, "We'll have so much fun"

"Yes we will…" Arf grinned a little herself, though her excitement had caused the girl to sprout her wolf-like ears and wagging tail. If that wasn't bad enough, the wolf girl had noticed the demeanor of the dirty-blonde heiress and had agreed on the same mindset.

'_Uhoh…' _Sonic gulped a little in comical nervousness, _'I sense a disturbance in the force'_

* * *

><p><strong>[Undisclosed Location]<br>[No BGM]**

Doctor Eggman had spent the majority of his day making sure all of his preparations were set. His thoughts were primarily focused around the phenomenon that was Little Planet. If the calculations were correct, which they usually were, the Planet's next appearance could be as early as tomorrow.

"Oh~ Ho-ho-ho!" the mad scientist laughed much like an arrogant noblewoman as his genius mind was hard at work, "Finally! All of the preparations are set! My robots have been reinforced in armor and weaponry. I don't know if they'll be able to stop the pesky hedgehog, but they'll be perfect for stalling.

"If I could discover the secret of Little Planet, then I can convert it to use in my machines" Eggman loudly declared his intentions, "And when I do, not only will I be able to conquer South Island, but the whole earth!"

From the darkness of the mad scientist's lair, a multitude of glowing eyes, representing the visors of his robots, could be seen. His machines, if the sparks of excess energy were of any clue, looked to boast plenty of power. They were far from perfect; however, as such energy came at a cost; and a cost that Eggman had no answer for.

"This is troubling" The doctor saw those signs and was unhappy with them, "My usual power source won't be able to stabilize these new mechs. I'll have to find an alternative source of energy

"Maybe if I could find something on Little Planet" Eggman thought to himself, suddenly sprouting a flashing light bulb as if he had a brilliant idea, "Yes… Little Planet must have a lot of power if it can disappear and reappear like I've seen before. If I could harness the planet's energy, then my robots will be unstoppable!

"Sonic better enjoy his victories now while he still can" The mad scientist gloated more in his arrogance, "Because, come tomorrow, it will be I who has the last laugh!"

Speaking of laughing, the mad scientist broke into his stereotypical evil laughter once more. It was probably a good thing that he was the only person in his lair aside from his robots; otherwise his sanity would be put into question. Regardless of the apparent lack of a social life, Doctor Eggman was still a formidable person to cross.

* * *

><p><strong>[South Island: Never Lake]<br>[No BGM]**

The reading of Tarot Cards, much like any other form of fortune telling, is something of a lost art. It can be awfully inconsistent with the results, which is why it takes either an insane amount of patience or almost a "blind" loyalty in whatever spiritual deities in which said cards represent. Still, if one can develop either, the reading can become something of a hobby.

It was the result of such hobby that led a young, pink-furred female hedgehog to set up a temporary shop of sorts close to the coast of the peaceful lake. Her attire, consisting of a green t-shirt over a white collar polo shirt, orange skirt that opened outward at her waist and blue tennis shoes, may have suggested a somewhat girlish personality, but she carried herself more like a tomboy. She wore a pinkish headband over her head to keep the stray amount of hair from the quills on her head from getting in her way, though there was a slight Mohawk just above her forehead that she found pleasing.

The pink hedgehog sat at a small table with the deck of tarot cards stacked to the side. She wanted to get one last reading in before the end of the day. With a sigh, she shuffled the deck and began her reading.

"Let's see…" the pink hedgehog flipped the first few cards over, "My adventure will start at the start of daylight on an unknown realm over a mysterious lake. I will encounter dangers on said adventure so I should be cautious.

"Along this journey I will encounter the hero of my desire" the girl sounded almost giddy as she read that part, but she had to school her features with discipline; the flipping of the next card helped in that matter, "He will not be alone and will be among partners and allies of his own.

"That much is usual, but I hope the cards favor me in the realm of romance" sadly, the flip of the final card drew a dirty look that was actually quite adorable from the little girl, "Your love will be unrequited."

With a huff, the pink hedgehog stood up from her table and glared at no direction in particular. One could get the feeling that this girl has had such a reading before. Still, with the reading complete, she had confirmed that for the most part, she was right to set up shop at Never Lake; and she will meet the hero of her worships soon. That part got her all giddy like a schoolgirl with a cute crush.

"Unrequited love, hah!" The girl pulled out a large hammer that resembled that of a sledgehammer or a mallet with a confident grin to her tomboyish features, "I'll show destiny how "unrequited" my love will be!"

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Residential District, Takamachi Residence]  
>[Local Time: 1840 hours (6:40 PM)]<br>[BGM: "Besaid Island" Final Fantasy X Remaster OST]**

With Lindy overseeing the temporary movement of the belongings to the temporary house that would serve as the base of operations planet-side, Fate and Arf were allowed to stay at the Takamachi house for a sleepover with their new friends. Dinner had already been eaten and the girls plus hedgehog and wolf familiars had showered in preparation for innocent nightly fun.

While Nanoha was busy retrieving snacks from her mother and Suzuka helping Alisa with getting the sleeping bags, Fate and Arf took the opportunity to pull Sonic aside for a little chat. They were hoping to get some answers as to the motives behind the blue hedgehog's actions. Unnoticed to them, they had a trio of eavesdroppers.

"Ano…" Fate, still feeling a bit awkward and shy in such a situation, tried to address the hedgehog, "Sonic-san…"

"You can drop the "-san" part" Sonic sought to correct the blonde, "I doubt I'm older than either you or Arf."

"R-right…" Fate nodded, still unsure of herself, "We'd like to um… thank you…"

"For?" the blue hedgehog couldn't help but allow a hint of curiosity to reach his tone.

"Don't play dumb, blue boy" Arf glared lightly at her counterpart, "if it weren't for you, we would've probably be at Mid-Childa right now fighting some courtroom boredom drama or something."

"It wasn't just me" Sonic admitted, "I just gave Lindy-san the info, and heck I wasn't even sure if it would work."

"Well it did, and we'd like to thank you for it" Arf knelt down to the eye-level of her hedgehog counterpart, "You didn't have to do it for our sake."

"May we ask why you did it?" Fate's tone was formal and polite, "And why you saved kaa-san?"

"To be honest, I'm still asking that question myself" the blue hedgehog shrugged, "I could probably think of many reasons why though"

"Can you pick one?" Fate asked

"After what that old woman's done; it just wouldn't feel right to let her probably die and shoulder all of her responsibility to you" Sonic admitted rather quickly, "In addition, I hate when my own efforts go to waste.

"So it was probably selfish of me, but like I ca- uwah!" the blue hedgehog was cut off from whatever he wished to say next as he found himself pulled into an emotional embrace by both Fate and Arf.

"Thank you…" Fate could barely stop the tears from falling as she displayed her gratitude for the hedgehog's efforts, "Thank you…"

"Sure… um… no problem" to say that Sonic felt a bit awkward was probably an understatement, and it had absolutely nothing to do with when Arf pulled him up and pressed the blue hedgehog's face right into her cleavage.

Fate smiled at the energetic antics of her familiar. She was taken by further surprise when the three eavesdroppers, Nanoha, Alisa and Suzuka, decided to group-hug her in a sneak attack. Sure the group hug would involve the hedgehog and wolf, but not until Sonic was freed of Arf's marshmallows.

"Uh… Arf?" Were Sonic in his teens and probably enduring a round of hormones, he would've probably had different thoughts to his predicament. He had a little problem with the lack of oxygen, "C-can't breathe!"

"Oh, right. Hee hee!" The wolf girl released her counterpart, "I guess I got a little overexcited."

"I'll say" Alisa grinned, "I'm a little jealous that you can pull that off."

"Ara~" Arf asked in almost a musical tone, "Did you want some too?"

"Maybe…" the dirty-blonde's grin grew more, "I think we can teach you to sha- ugh!"

"Pillow fight!" Sonic interrupted the antics of the Anglophone with a well-aimed pillow to her head! He had to gulp a little when the pillow slid off the girl's face, revealing her annoyed expression.

"Oh… so you want to play" Alisa's frown was quickly turned upside down and she filled the room with her feral mischievous intent, "Then it is on!"

The pillow fight went on for a good portion of the night until their energy was exhausted. No one was immune to the pillows and the room was beset with giggles for the rest of the sleepover until they all retired to their sleeping bags. For everyone, Fate especially, it was so fun to be able to bond with new friends. As much of a peaceful end the night was, the following day would hold an adventure that could change the lives of all.

**[End of Main Chapter]  
>[But wait, there's more!]<strong>

* * *

><p><strong>[Omake: Precia's Test]<strong>

Precia Testarossa, through her own means of scrying and magic, watched one of Fate's earlier battles with Nanoha. While her attention was on the blonde, she never stopped herself from sneaking glances at the girl in white.

"Hmmm…" the old woman spent a moment to focus entirely on the girl in white; analyzing her. With a rather stoic expression on her face that was betrayed by a blush on her cheeks that indicated less innocent thoughts, her analysis was complete.

"This girl…" The woman pointed her finger at Nanoha, "PASSES!"

What exactly Nanoha passes in is a mystery.

**[To be continued?]**

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 16]<strong>

Author's Note: They're Baaaaaaaaaaaaack! The omakes are back! With the conclusion of the Jewel Seed arc, I will take some time to bring back a lighter side of things to the story. And this sets up most of Little Planet. Hmmm… can anyone identify a new character I just introduced? Read, review, all that jazz, I'd like to see some opinions.


	17. Chapter 17

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter to Sonic the Hedgehog0: Lyrical Familiar; the Little Planet arc, I'll try to be careful on how I play this one out in comparison to Knight of the Night Sky; it'll be similar, but different; here we go! Usual disclaimers apply.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth: Japan]<br>[South Island: Never Lake]  
>[Time: 0450 hours]<br>[BGM: "Little Planet" Sonic CD (JP/EU)]**

The large lake in South Island known as Never Lake held an aura of mystery about it. Little was known about the lake; aside from the urban legend spread about from the local animal population around South Island. It was said that for a month of every year, a "planet" would appear over the large lake. The planet would just float above the lake for a month before disappearing for the rest of the year. Its name was unknown to all, but most have taken to calling it "Little Planet" due to its size or "Miracle Planet due to its rare presence and anomaly.

The sun had yet to even grace Never Lake with its rising glow when the anomaly known as "Little Planet" had appeared. It arrived in a flash of light that would've rendered anyone who dared to look momentarily blind. When the light subsided, there it was; Little Planet, stabilized in float aside from a slight rotation that came.

The planet was a beautiful sight for any who would give it a glance. A majority of the planet's surface was water, clean and pure. The landmasses were a few, but diverse, ranging from a few mountain-based volcanoes and desert-based cacti to the palm trees of the tropical coast. It had a slight rotation on its axis and an aura of mystery much like the lake it was floating above.

The sudden appearance of Little Planet had woken up a fair number of the Lake's inhabitants. Among one of those was the young pink hedgehog; and much like some 7 year old girls, she didn't quite approve of her beauty rest being so rudely interrupted. It was understandable, though, as the sounds were loud and echoing throughout the area and the light threatened to assault her eyes had they been opened.

"Mou…" The pink girl groaned as she stirred awake, her gloved hand fingering the grip of her large hammer, "Whoever decided to wake me up this early in the morning is in for a world of hurt…"

She didn't get much further along that line of thought, however, when she caught a glimpse of the sight before her. In disbelief, she rubbed her eyes wider to make sure she wasn't hallucinating. That "planet" certainly wasn't there last night; she was sure of that. Needless to say, the pink hedgehog was almost speechless.

"Pretty…" she said in awe and found herself staring at such a sight. Though she was still tired and sluggish from her early awakening, her mind was still able to make the connections to her memory.

"This must be the unknown realm" The hedgehog observed, looking back briefly to her recent tarot card reading, "This is where my adventure begins…"

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: "Collision Chaos" Zone]<br>[BGM: "Little Planet" Sonic CD (JP/EU)]**

Little Planet, despite being a world of mystery in of itself, didn't boast of much in the way of population aside from the local animals and plant life. The planet had regions that had evidenced of a technological development, but no reasoning behind how it was possible. The animals weren't sentient like the rare ones on South Island, and the planet was devoid of humans. That didn't mean Little Planet was incapable of supporting human life, as its lone sentient example was living proof of that.

A young girl took in the sight of the rising sun as it graced the land of her home. She stood from the top of a casino which overlooked a mechanized forest. The girl was somewhat shorter than the average human of her age and had long, golden-blonde hair which had a portion tied into twin-tails with sky-blue hair ties. They were tied to separate the hair tails from the rest of her hair which flowed down to where it just graced the small of her back. Perhaps it was for a dramatic effect, but the wind blew by in a way that played with her hair.

The girl's outfit was cute and girly, but not overly so; a white sleeveless top with a dark blue collar and a sky-blue necktie that matched with her hair ties. She donned a pair of blue wristbands on her hands that matched the blue of her collared shirt. Her shoulders were bare aside from a sky-blue ribbon tied to her left shoulder just at the bicep. She had worn a white-blue short skirt with a bluish-green skirt miniskirt over it. Attached to her skirt at the waist was a blue waist-cape that flared out into two points and had insignias of stars at her hips. On her feet were blue tennis shoes and above her right ankle was a matching blue ribbon tied up.

In her hands was a pair of matching pistols that looked almost as threatening as water guns. The grips of the pistols were sky-blue to match with the ribbons and had a pair of greenish ribbons attached to the butts. The barrels were a whitish-silver but the remainder parts of the guns were black.

The girl's face would've drawn the most attention. From the way she appeared, she had a resemblance to Fate. She had the same eyes, crimson red, but they glimmered with youthful innocence, adventure and maybe a dash of mischief. She had that aura about her that would make anyone cheerful.

"Looks like we're back to civilization again" The girl spoke with a voice much alike Fate's, though with more confidence and energy, "And this time, we will break free of this home and move on; ne, Lucky Star?"

"_**Yes, Sir!"**_ came the reply from her left-hand pistol. The voice held a striking resemblance to Bardiche with that baritone, albeit lighter.

The girl giggled a little in joy from her device's reply. Sadly, her joy was dimmed when she saw several shadows looming over her head. Upon looking upwards, she could see what appeared to be the shadow of a male, fat human riding a scooter of sorts with countless shadows of robots behind him.

"Is that… an egg?" The girl thought out loud in observation, comparing the odd looking individual to an egg.

"_**Sir! Danger is close!"**_ Lucky Star cautioned the young girl, _**"Caution is advised."**_

"Mou… Never can get a break, can I?" The girl sighed in exasperation and glanced at the intruders one more time before vacating her position, "Well, might as well have some fun."

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 17<br>Once Upon a Planet**

* * *

><p><strong>[South Island: Never Lake]<br>[Local Time: 0550 hours]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

A certain pink hedgehog had left the lake for a few minutes to fetch some breakfast before returning. She was still surprised by the sight of Little Planet, but was relieved that it didn't go anywhere when she had to answer the call of her hunger. In her mindset, Little Planet's presence matched the sudden appearance of the mysterious realm in where her adventure would begin.

"Oh… Sonic…" the pink hedgehog dreamily sighed, thinking about her hero and target of her affections. Whether it was a young girl's innocent crush or not was yet to be determined, "How I've longed to meet you. Ever since I first saw you"

The pink hedgehog thought back several months ago. It was on the same day that Doctor Eggman first started his conquest on South Island. She could remember being surrounded by robots and having no place to go; the blue blur dismantling all of the robots in one shot, and her only glimpse at Sonic the Hedgehog.

"How long has it been since? Months? I've lost count…" The pink girl lamented with a soft sigh, "I can't wait to see him again and get to thank him for saving me…

"Still, if Sonic's going to be up there then I should too" the pink girl's chain of thought finally led to her dilemma, "But how do I get up there? I can't fly"

A loud explosive boom snapped the hedgehog from her thoughts. The front half of the widest mountain close to the shoreline of the lake exploded; what was left of it was what appeared to be a rock formation in the shape of Doctor Eggman's face with the cartoonish, funky moustache sticking out. A chain suddenly shot out from the middle of the face's teeth and attached itself to the planet above the lake.

"Uh… okay…" The pink hedgehog wasn't quite sure what to think of what just happened and found herself scratching her head to figure it out, "That was weird…"

She watched as ground-based robots started to roll their way up the chain and toward the planet above. That was important to the girl because she wasn't nearly as heavy as the mechs. Her mind was already at work in figuring out a way to use the chain to her advantage.

"I don't need to fly, I'll just use this chain" The girl squealed in delight over her spectacular idea being formulated. Determination filling her steps, she quickly started for the chain, "Just you wait Sonic."

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: "Metallic Madness" Zone]<br>[Time: 0630 hours]  
>[BGM: "Metallic Madness ~Present" Sonic CD (JPEU)]**

Doctor Eggman spent the good part of the past hour overseeing the tasks he assigned for his robots from his new base on the Planet. It didn't take him long for his intellect to figure out some of the secrets of Little Planet and applied them to his machines. The planet had its own sense of "time"; and it had three sets of "worlds" varied by the time. Within seconds, one could travel to the past, present or possible future of a particular zone, just by utilizing the signs spread out through the zone. He also had solved a problem with the power supply for his robots. He was able to extract seeds from the very soil of Little Planet and use them to power his machines.

"Perfect!" The doctor shouted in glee, "I can use the signs in these zones to travel to the past and place my teleport devices there. Robots will come from my base deep in South Island and overrun the past and, in effect, present of each zone.

"So long as I can rule the past and present of Little Planet, I can mold the future to my liking. But, there is one other loose end I must take care of before I can use Little Planet to conquer the earth" The doctor's plans had one little issue, aside from the annoying blue hedgehog who would come by to spoil the fun, "The Time Stones; with 7 I will be able to harness true control over all time here.

"My forces have already collected six, but it's the last one that eludes me. None of my sensors have been able to pick it up and with my sensors being able to detect the presence of the stones without interference from Little Planet, that shouldn't be possible. Unless…" The scientist gritted his teeth and if looks could kill with the glare he sent to his monitor, it would've been out of continues, "They are being jammed…"

A string of alarms dragged the Doctor's attention to a new window that just opened up on the monitor. The alert indicated that several of his robots were destroyed almost in succession. While he was expecting the presence of the blue hedgehog to interfere with his plot once more, he hadn't expected it this soon.

"O~ho-ho-ho! Uninvited guests already?" The doctor's surprise was easily overmatched by his arrogance in his fleet, "Looks like I'll have to head out there and greet them personally."

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Residential district: Takamachi Residence]  
>[Local time 0700 hours]<br>[BGM: "Welcome to Our Town" Final Fantasy IV OST (Arrangement)]**

With the fun of the previous night's sleepover taken as a factor, it was almost expected that Sonic was a bit late in waking up. The same could not be said for the girls, though, as they were the first to get up. The blue hedgehog could attest to that when he heard the giggling of familiar voices teasing his ears. As he was still partially asleep, he could only discern bits and pieces from the girls, but he could already tell they were up to something.

"Um… is this really okay?" Fate's voice was the first he could pick out, mostly due to how her soft voice carried her uncertainty.

"It's fine, Fate-chan" The second voice was Nanoha's; he could tell by familiarity and the cheerfully confident tone of the brunette. She would appear to be the mastermind behind whatever the girls were up to.

"I don't get why we have to be so tame in doing this" the energetic and mischievous voice of Arisa Bunnings (1) was next, "I was hoping to have a little fun out of it."

"Arisa-chan… we're too young for the type of "fun" you had in mind." Suzuka's voice came next; it wasn't as soft as Fate's and her tone carried some exasperation as she scolded the Anglophone

"Well, there goes my idea" Arf's voice came last and she sounded almost like she was pouting in defeat.

Sonic didn't need elementary to figure out that the girls had planned to surprise him when he woke up, but for what reason? Curiosity growing from his understanding; he tried peak through a small opening of his eyelids to see what the girls had in mind. The morning light had made him wince though and thus alert to the girls that he was starting to stir.

"Shh…" Nanoha silenced the chatter with her excited observation, "He's waking up!"

The hedgehog groaned sleepily and slowly started to stir again. Keeping his eyes closed until he was confident that the morning sun wouldn't try to assault him once more, he stretched his arms and legs a bit from his futon. With the giggling voices of the girls teasing his ears once more, Sonic decided to open his eyes and wake up to take whatever the girls had in mind.

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY SONIC!" All 5 of the girls said at once; each in varying volume ranging from Fate's soft voice to Arisa's loud one.

"Uwah!" the poor hedgehog flailed a bit, he had expected something of a surprise but didn't expect them to be so energetic about it, "Good morning?"

"Surprised Sonic-kun?" Nanoha cheerfully patted the blue hedgehog's head, bouncing her hands on the pointed ears a few times

"A little…" Sonic nodded a little, understanding the reasoning behind the surprise, "How did you know about my birthday?"

"I kinda cheated with our link" Nanoha admitted in comical guilt, "I noticed that you would keep track of this date every year. It was how I found out about your age when I was trying to determine if you were going to be my younger or older sibling."

"She only told us this last night" Suzuka added, "She probably would've forgotten had she not looked at the calendar."

"She can forget her own birthday sometimes" Arisa added as well, taking the opportunity for a quick shot at embarrassing her friend.

"Mou, you two…" Nanoha pouted, her cheeks sporting a cute shade of pink in embarrassment, "At any rate, I saw that you would try to celebrate today whenever it came, but you didn't have many friends to play with"

"S-so um… Nanoha said that we should surprise you this morning." Fate shyly followed up, having to recall that conversation from the previous night, "She didn't want you to feel so lonely"

"And that's about it" Arf concluded rather happily, noting idly in her mind the effort that Nanoha had done to reach out to Fate to resolve that lonely feeling.

"Thank you…" Sonic felt a little self-conscious from the attention, but he was still nonetheless grateful that he finally had friends to have fun with; though in the big picture, he figured he was still the youngest having just turned 9 years old.

The scene went from touching to a cute sort of funny when the shared hunger of the girls that had come from not eating breakfast yet had finally decided to take form. One-by-one, each kid felt their cheeks flush cutely as their stomachs growled for attention and fuel. The scene was a cute reminder that despite how wise and thoughtful they can be, they were all still kids after all.

"Nyahahaha…" Nanoha broke the silence first, "I think we should have breakfast before we can celebrate more"

"Y-yeah!" the others all nodded in agreement. The embarrassment was plainly evidenced in their faces; which only added to the cuteness of the scene.

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence: Kitchen]<br>[Local Time: 0710 hours]  
>[BGM: "Welcome to Our Town" Final Fantasy IV (Arrangement) OST]<strong>

If there was one thing Momoko Takamachi knew about hosting sleepovers; there was always a responsibility to make sure that the guests were fed in the morning. What she didn't expect, though, was for an additional set of hands to assist her in fixing breakfast for said children. Her surprise was easily understood and expected when she found the preparation of breakfast to be assisted by Lindy Harlaown, another guest of her house for the day.

"Lindy-san" The kind mother, while she wasn't one to refuse help, still didn't feel it right to add a burden to her guest, "I am grateful, but you don't need to be helping me with this"

"I understand, however I'm not just here for a social call." The admiral replied, feeling a little regretful that she had to use the situation to request for the aid of Momoko's daughter again, "We had a sudden development at the office, and I'm unfortunately going to need Nanoha-san and Sonic-san's help."

"Coincidentally this is Sonic-kun's birthday" Momoko lamented with a sigh, feeling rather regretful of the timing more than anything else.

"Well at least we'll be able to deal with it early" Lindy noted with optimism, "The sooner it's resolved, the sooner you can celebrate."

"Good morning!" chorused 6 young voices as the kids who were part of the sleepover entered the living room of the house. Lindy and Momoko shared a laugh or two at the innocence the collected youth still had.

"Breakfast should be ready in a minute" Lindy informed them as they entered; in doing so, she had the effect of making her presence known, drawing looks of surprise and curiosity from a select few.

"Eh?! Lindy-san" Nanoha caught herself staring at the woman for a moment before recovering from her surprise, "What are you doing here?"

"We've got work to do" the woman answered as she passed out plates with miso soup, steamed rice and tamagoayki for all. When finished, the admiral moved to the living room with Durandal in her grasp, "I'll explain as you eat, but take your time"

"I think I can already guess" Sonic noted neutrally, "Little Planet"

"Correct" Lindy nodded as she held out the familiar card that was Durandal in Standby Form, "Durandal?"

**[BGM Insert: "Baron Castle" Final Fantasy IV (Arrangement)]**

"_**Okay, boss!"**_ Was the reply from the card as it processed the unspoken request from its master. Floating screens appeared from the device as it presented several things at once; including the appearance of Little Planet and data that Lindy would no doubt explain.

"At about 0450 hours local time to Japan; our scanners on the Arthra (2) detected a dimensional disturbance located at this region in South Island identified as Never Lake." Lindy gestured her right finger at the feed that displayed the sudden appearance of Little Planet, "We've confirmed that the anomaly was the sudden appearance of this floating, for lack of a better term, satellite."

"That's Little Planet alright" Sonic noted, confirming the unsaid suspicion that was drawn from the implications, "You might want to keep an eye on it. It can change its looks in a flash"

"Duly noted" Lindy nodded, making a mental note to file that detail away before she continued on, "When it appeared, I had first thought about deploying a small scouting force, but with my resources still short in dealing with the aftermath of the Jewel Seed incident, it would've been you kids, and I'd figure it'd be best that I let you all sleep in."

"Is that alright?" Nanoha felt a little bit guilty after hearing Lindy admit that, "If something were to happen, it could've been bad for you"

"I'm allowed at least some discretion as this world is non-administrated" Lindy assured the girl, sure it was a technicality, but it was valid, "Had this been an administrated world, I wouldn't have as much discretion.

"At any rate, the situation has escalated within the past two hours" On a hand motion from Lindy, Durandal displayed footage of the mountain's collapse, the inscription of Eggman's face on said mountain and the chain shooting from the teeth and attaching to Little Planet. "Look familiar?"

"Eggman…" Sonic nodded and smirked a little in quipping, "His ego has reached its "peak"."

"He's made his move" Lindy smirked a little, finding the quip somewhat cute but felt that the hedgehog probably could've done better; yet she kept that thought aside and kept on topic, "We've detected a massive amount of his units out there on the surface of the world. We have yet to determine what his goal is, but we have a few speculations.

"We've confirmed the presence of at least 7 items or objects of power; their signal is consistent similar to the Jewel Seeds." Lindy gestured to the dots that appeared on a screen that displayed the results of a recent scan of Little Planet, "Within the past hour, we can determine that 6 of those signals have been moved to a central point. I speculate that someone's gathering them for a purpose."

"Probably Eggman" Sonic interjected with his opinion, "He's done it before"

"So has Mother, with the Jewel Seeds" Fate added softly, unfortunately the shiver that she made when she drew upon her memory wasn't missed by anyone.

There was a brief pause there as Fate felt more self-conscious in her admission. Much as she loved Precia as her mother, it was still understandably hard to just put aside what the woman had done. Nanoha, seeing the escalating nerves, latched on to Fate and pulled her into a hug. Her action did calm her new friend down, but also drew a rather adorable blush from the blonde.

"In any case, we'll have to look into it." Lindy cleared her throat to focus attention back on the matter at hand once more, "In addition, we've also been able to confirm the presence of another mage in the vicinity. That's a least what we could gather from the discharges we've been detecting.

"The problem though is that we can't determine the identity of this mage. We can't get a clear enough signal to make an attempt at identifying their signature." The admiral gestured to another point on the screen that seemed static and inconsistent, "In addition, whatever wavelength we could gather is unregistered to the TSAB. That doesn't mean that we don't know anything about the signature. We've been able to detect trace elements of Photon magic."

"Isn't that Fate-chan's element?" Nanoha interjected, drawing the comparison from her memory.

"Hai, but if Fate-san was there, we would've known so it couldn't have been her" Lindy shook her head, glancing at the aforementioned blonde with little malice to her, "Still it is curious, that element is rare."

"I learned all of my spells from Rynith" Fate answered an implied question from the glance, "She was Mother's familiar, but she died after my training was finished"

"The fact that you were learning spells from your mother's familiar basically means that your mother's spells were used as a base for yours." Lindy noted, "So that leads us nowhere."

"What about if the element was inherited? Like a next of kin or something?" Sonic offered, flinching a little at the collective amount of stares he was getting, "What?"

"You are the last person I'd expect to hear that question from" Arf explained bluntly, getting a nod of agreement or two from Fate and Lindy.

"Still, it would make sense" the admiral agreed, "Either that or she taught the specific spell that happens to have that element. With her isolation, that is unlikely. But there is no next of kin to be confirmed. Her biological daughter would come to mind, but she's been missing for the past 26 years; and that status won't change unless she somehow shows up or is declared dead, and we can't do that unless we find her body.

"At any rate, this will end my briefing; I'll get to the orders I'll have for you four in a moment" the admiral addressed the four, "Any questions before I start?"

"No, ma'am!" Sonic, Nanoha, Fate and Arf all shook their heads. If any of them did have any questions, they had other thoughts preoccupying them. Fate was a little nervous over the mysterious mage as was Arf in connection. Sonic was a little nervous about facing Eggman again even if he didn't say anything. Nanoha was feeling the same thing through the emphatic link with her familiar.

"Alright, I'm going to deploy you in a team." The admiral cleared her throat, gestured to the displays from her device and then started to give out her orders, "Your primary objective is to scout out Little Planet. Find out whatever Eggman is up to over there and stop him. While you're there, you are to identify this unregistered mage is and, if possible, make an alliance with them if they aren't already allied. Your last objective is to clear out any hostile units. Understood?"

"Yes, Ma'am!" The four acknowledged when the woman used the official tone with them. Their response gave Momoko little doubt about the respect that Lindy had, though she had a feeling that there wasn't much doubt in the first place.

"Good; get ready to go when you're finished with breakfast" the woman spoke with certainty, though her tone also implied that there wasn't a need to rush, "I'd prefer that we get started at 0800 at the earliest. I'll have a dimension transfer set up for you to take to the Arthra and from there, Little Planet. Unless one of you knows how to handle the spell already"

"We can" Fate answered softly, "Arf and I can handle it; we'll just need the coordinates."

"I'll have them forwarded to Bardiche" Lindy sent a thankful smile to the young blonde, widening it a little when she saw the cute blush from the aforementioned Fate, "Thank you for the assistance"

"Just trying to help" Fate nodded softly in her modest and awkward nature.

"Well you can't fight evil on an empty stomach" Momoko playfully teased, noting the fact that said children had yet to finish their breakfasts, much to their embarrassment, "Your breakfast isn't going to get any warmer."

"Right!" The kids acknowledged at the same time before resuming their meal, "Thank you for the food!"

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: "Palmtree Panic" Zone]<br>[Local time: 0755]  
>[BGM: "Palmtree Panic" Sonic CD (JPEU)]**

The four mages, clad in their respective Barrier Jackets, appeared from the yellow magic circle that had spawned out of nowhere. The sight they were greeted to was beyond any word that was descriptive. They had transferred into a tropical region that was scattered with sharp mountains and waterfalls. What gave the zone its moniker were the vast amount of tropical palm trees and the star-shaped plants along the coast. It would've made a perfect, picturesque view, if not for the patrol robots that were themed like bugs.

"Amazing…" Nanoha was the first to take notice of the natural beauty that surrounded her and the others.

"It is…" Fate was next; she was normally of the soft spoken type, but her silence in awe still was not missed.

"Mid-Childa has a huge frontier that we used to live on" Arf drew a memory in comparison to her and Fate's life prior to the Garden of Time, "But I don't think it can top this!"

"It reminds me of Green Hill; though that zone also had robots ruining the picture." Sonic reflected briefly before gesturing with one of his sword hands toward the bug-themed robots, "Themed robots again; they weren't original the first time."

"These guys gave you trouble?" Arf stifled a gawk or two in exasperation, "They don't look like much"

"Eh… they were annoying back then too" the blue hedgehog shrugged as he took the point position to lead said group, "I'll take the lead here, if only because I've faced these things before"

The latter trio nodded in agreement and fell silent to focus on the task at hand. Their first part was a straightforward trek, as Sonic had noticeably started off with a warm up jog that was fast but easily matched by the others in flight. No one really asked why the hedgehog had opted to take the ground first, but Nanoha had understood it was to familiarize himself with the feeling again, she had little doubt that her familiar would join in the skies.

They were soon tested with their first wave of robots. A formation of robots resembling mosquitos attempted to ram straightforward into the flying trio while a few had attempted to dive-bomb the running hedgehog. The girls were able to roll to a side as the mosquitos passed and Sonic had no issue in side-stepping the ones after him. However, the ones that went after the girls were able to make another pass while the ones that had dive-bombed were stuck in the grass.

"They'll just keep trying that if you're in the air." Sonic cautioned as he sliced a few of the downed mosquitos with his blades. The higher quality of armor was noticeable as he did have to work a little harder, but then again, he's improved as well since the adventure on South Island, "Get them on the ground and you'll be able to take them out."

The girls didn't need to be told twice before they followed the advice. Little surprise, it worked and the mosquito robots had the design flaw of being unable to fly backwards. Fate, Arf and Nanoha found the experience rather lacking, but they were spoiled with having to deal with the much tougher robots at the Garden of Time. Sonic had that feeling as well; while he'd probably admit that Eggman had improved, so did he.

Taking a moment to check out the robots, Sonic noticed the absence of any animals inside the cores of the robots. Instead, seeds dropped out from the remains and dropped into the soil, blooming into flowers almost instantly.

"This is new" The hedgehog commented idly.

"I thought you said Eggman used animals" Nanoha glanced at her familiar in confusion, "These are flowers"

"Maybe he used a new power source" Fate offered, "In case the animals weren't powerful enough."

"These robots have been "upgraded" since I last fought them" Sonic noted idly, before realizing that they had lingered for longer than desired. Filing away the details of Eggman's improvement to be addressed another day, the hedgehog continued his trek, flanked by Nanoha, Fate and Arf.

If Sonic had known what would've happened next, he would've either taken to the air much sooner or at least speed up his trek. He was blind sighted in mid stride by a large pink blur of some speed.

"UWAH!" the young hedgehog was startled and found himself; lying underneath the form of a pink hedgehog girl. Even worse he ended up in an embarrassing position; as said girl had worn an orange miniskirt that had flared up, revealing her white panties for all to see.

"Oh Sonic~!" said pink girl dreamily started and clung to said blue hedgehog, either oblivious or uncaring to the pantie show she was giving as well as the blushing reactions from the other girls, "I've been wanting to see you for so long!"

"Uh… two things" Sonic felt rather awkward at the moment, and it wasn't just from the pantie show, "One: Who are you? Two: Can you get off of me please?"

"Oh~ hee-hee…" The pink girl giggled a bit in embarrassment and stood up, took a moment to dust that orange skirt off of any dirt, "Sorry, I kinda got carried away."

"Right…" Arf found herself scoffing softly in disbelief; luckily the pink hedgehog didn't seem to notice.

"I am Amy, Amy Rose!" The pink hedgehog, newly identified as Amy Rose, bowed politely in her greeting, "We've only seen each other once, so I'm not surprised if you don't remember me."

"I think I'd remember if we met…" Sonic hadn't even seen the girl up until this point and already he found his patience tiring.

"You saved my life a few months ago" Amy, oblivious to the strain that trying patience, explained, "I was cornered by a bunch of robots and I didn't have enough time to protect myself until you came along. I tried to say something, but you were already gone"

"Well, um…" Sonic, though with a subtle relief that the girl in front of him wasn't injured or captured by Eggman back then, still felt a tad bit awkward by the situation, "You're welcome?"

"My tarot cards said that you were going to be here today, so here I am" Amy stated; then turned around to face the trio of two mages plus familiar behind her and sized them up with neutral eyes. She was less bothered by the fact that they were humans, but was annoyed that they were female, "They also said you wouldn't be alone."

"Eh? Well um… I'm Nanoha; Takamachi Nanoha" The white-clad mage introduced herself politely, albeit awkwardly so and started to struggle with finding the right words to say under the analyzing glance of the 7 year old pink hedgehog, "And I'm Sonic-kun's um…"

"Master" Fate interjected innocently and truthfully.

Upon hearing the statement, Amy Rose's analyzing gaze at Nanoha turned into one of fury. No one could really blame Fate for making such an innocent statement, as it was true in the only context that she could draw comparison from. Unfortunately, and in defense of Amy Rose, the context was not understood by the pink hedgehog.

"Master?! You turned Sonic into your SLAVE?!" The pink hedgehog, losing control of her volatile temper, pulled out her sledgehammer, rightfully scaring the poor girl in white, "I'll make you pay!"

"_Uh-oh…" _Nanoha nervously said in telepathy to her allies she saw Amy begin to rush for her, _"H-help! Please!"_

"_**Defenser!"**_ Her aid came in the form of Fate stepping in front of her and Bardiche declaring the aforementioned spell.

Amy shrieked like a mad girl and slammed her piko-piko hammer right into the barrier. Despite the Defenser spell being one of the lower-powered spells for the use of protection, it still was able to hold the hammer-crazy hedgehog at bay. That alone was the clue that said Amy Rose had little to no talent for magic, otherwise she would've had a chance of piercing the barrier.

The pink hedgehog stumbled back a ways from the recoil effect of her failed rush. Upon taking notice the blonde taking the defensive stance in front of the girl-in-white, Amy was stricken with confusion. The moment she had taken to calm down and catch her breath gave her the opportunity to get a closer look at said blonde.

"Huh? You look familiar" The pink hedgehog voiced said confusion and familiar feelings, "Didn't I just see you a few minutes ago?"

"Huh?" Now it was Fate's turn to be stricken by confusion, "You must be mistaken, we haven't met before."

"I'm sure I just saw you…" Amy countered with her argument, "You were a little bit shorter though and had a different outfit on, but I'm sure I recognize your hair and face."

An awkward silence fell among the group as the mages and familiars had to think about what the pink hedgehog had said. She might've been easy to blow up over a misunderstanding, but her tone of voice held confusion; and she had appeared honest.

Sonic had felt his patience run low once again; the pink hedgehog was one misunderstanding or confusion after another. It was his impatience that led to the necessity of a retreat. With that need in mind, the blue hedgehog made his move and ensnared Amy with a Restrict Lock. The spell wasn't as powerful as his master's, but he was purposefully holding back so the girl wasn't going to be harmed.

"Eh?" Amy blinked in surprise and found herself unable to break the magical binding despite her best efforts, "Sonic?"

"Sorry, but we have other places to be" Sonic did appear sincere in his apology. He quickly made a few gestures for the others to follow him before taking off in a blistering burst of speed. There was little delay before Nanoha, Arf and Fate followed suit, leaving a confused Amy Rose in their wake.

"Mou…" The pink hedgehog grumbled, "Did they really have to leave?!"

It wasn't smooth sailing for the aforementioned four, though. In their haste to get away from the odd pink hedgehog, no one noticed the sign in their path that had read "Future" before they had passed it. Before any of them could react, space appeared to warp around them as they were blinded by a flash of light.

* * *

><p><strong>[Palmtree Panic: Future]<br>[BGM: "Palmtree Panic ~Good Future" Sonic CD (JP/EU)]**

The four had to stop and take a look at where their haste had led them. The zone appeared similar to the one they were just in. The biggest difference was that the tropical jungle had appeared to be somewhat mechanized, but in a peaceful manner. If any of them were to figure out how to describe it; they might have said it was futuristic. Regardless, it still held the beauty of the original zone they had landed in.

"Whoa…" now it was Sonic who broke the metaphorical ice first, "This is something…"

"This kinda looks like one of those games set in the future or something" Nanoha commented, referring to some of the RPG games that she, Arisa and Suzuka had played that held a futuristic environment.

"I don't see any robots…" Arf took notice of the lack or robots as there were animals frolicking about in a peaceful manner, "Did something happen to them?"

"No clue" Sonic shook his head in thought, "But at least we're away from that odd girl."

"H-hai…" Fate nodded in agreement, but still had something plaguing her mind in reference to the pink hedgehog, "But what she said about me looking familiar to her bothers me…"

"Don't worry about it, Fate-chan, I'm sure she was just mistaken" Nanoha assured the blonde, "We can always ask her the next time we see her."

"Yeah" Fate trailed off softly; she felt a little bit guilty over causing the misunderstanding, "um… Sorry, Nanoha..."

"Huh?" said brunette glanced at her friend in confusion, "What for?"

"Because of what I said, that girl tried to hurt you" Fate slowed her trek a little in guilt.

"It's fine, you had no way of knowing whether or not Amy Rose-san would've understood what you meant or not" Nanoha sent a small smile of optimism, "We'll clear it up with her."

"Thanks" Fate returned the smile with one of her own, showing just how appreciative she was of her new friend's optimism and energy.

The group pressed on through the futuristic, tropical jungle. They admired the scenery a little as they went; understandable, as the ledges and terrain were decorated with pipes that had clean, pure water flowing through them. The girls would've felt more in awe at the scenery, but their resident hedgehog decided to stop at a clearing in the zone.

"Attention!" Sonic, having a little fun, made his best impersonation of a drill sergeant.

"Okay, I'll bite" Arf said in some annoyance, "Why are we stopping?"

"You'll see…" the hedgehog smirked a little, sending a knowing glance at his master, "Say, Nanoha, you remember those RPGs we played with Arisa-chan and Suzuka-chan?"

"Yeah" Nanoha was almost afraid to ask where Sonic was going with the chain of thought, "Why?"

"You know what happens when the heroes of said games enter conveniently placed clearings?" Sonic's smirk widened a little as if he had struck genius gold, "This place certainly looks perfect for an ambush."

"This isn't some game" Arf growled in annoyance, "I doubt this "Eggman" guy is so unoriginal enough to try that"

**[BGM: "Boss!" Sonic CD (JP/EU)]**

"O~ Ho-ho-ho-ho-ho!" Sure enough, the noblewoman-like laugh that was familiar only to Sonic proved the wolf-girl wrong. The mad scientist dropped down in a special Egg-Mobile that was attached to a pink-themed bipedal mech that held bouncy bumpers on its arms and spikes along the feet.

Arf's mouth hung for a moment in stunned surprise. The other three, Fate included, couldn't help but share a giggle or two at the fact that said wolf-girl was so easily surprised.

"Well, well, well… If it isn't the pesky little hedgehog" The doctor's tone of voice was condescending and arrogant while also full of malice as he sized up the blue rodent. Eggman's evil grin widened a little in his wickedness when he caught sight of the girls behind him, "Oh? And what's this? You brought along a few girlfriends as well"

"As if!" Arf was oddly the only one who took offense to that as Fate and Nanoha might've zoned out in each other's gaze at the mention of girlfriends.

"Regardless, I'm here on a little patrol" The doctor was quick to wave off the squabble with the wolf-teen, "As you can see, someone has already been screwing with my plans. I had first thought it was you, but then my sentry robots had informed me that you were a little late to the party."

"Breakfast is the most important meal of the day you know, Eggman" Sonic shot back, "We can't save the world on an empty stomach, can we?"

"Doctor Eggman" Nanoha directed a rather serious glare at the scientist, already not having a good impression from the face-to-face meeting, "Your actions here are um... illegal. Stand down now otherwise we will arrest you"

"Oh please, little kiddy, you'll have to do better than that if you want to intimidate me" The scientist smirked a little bit more in his arrogance as he made his walker step back and forth a few times, "Like I said before, you are late to the party, but I am going to make sure you don't interfere with my plans!"

**[VS: EGG-HVC-001]**

The doctor made a mad dash rush for the four with his walker. Eggman had designed the walker with the blue hedgehog's abilities in mind as with every step the walker made, one of the arms would extend outward and the bumper would act as a shield. Unfortunately, the doctor didn't take into account of the possibility that Sonic had picked up any abilities that would've rendered that strategy moot; and his strategy quickly saw failure when the four took to the skies.

"H-hey!" The doctor slammed the console of his Egg-Mobile in childish fury, "Get back down here."

The hedgehog merely shook his head and had a confident smirk of his own when he gripped his twin kodachi blades by their hilts and drew them at the same time. In a flash of light-blue light synonymous with his speed, Sonic sliced through one of the arms with his combined spin-and-sword attack. The only sound that indicated the impact of steel was the small explosion from the damaged arm

"H-hey!" The doctor almost screamed

"_**Arc Saber!"**_ Bardiche's voice made Eggman look up to the resident blonde with the scythe in hand. With barely a grunt, Fate swung Bardiche and detached the blade. Much like the hedgehog's attack, the Arc Saber made short work of the other arm that was attached to the Egg-Walker.

"Stop that!" The nerves started to get to Eggman as he found one of his better creations start to crumble at the efforts of pre-teens. The doctor began to pale as he found himself staring at a smirking wolf-girl.

"This will be fun!" Arf said as she shape shifted into her large wolf form, bared her teeth in a dangerous grin, and generated a volley of Photon Lancers that began to surround the scientist, "Any last words?"

"Oh…" Eggman was no idiot, he knew a bad spot when he was in one; and he was definitely in one with the wolf, "Mother…"

With a feral roar, Arf fired off the Photon Lancers in the Multi-shot variant. As they were all fired from point blank and in rapid succession, there was little doubt to the accuracy from said spell. The lancers made scrap metal from what was left of the original Egg-Mobile. The force of the explosion sent Eggman into a retreat, fearful for his own life, leaving behind an odd gem in his wake.

**[Boss Neutralized]  
>[Jingle: "Act Clear" Sonic CD (USA)]<strong>

Much to the confusion of Arf and Fate, Sonic and Nanoha performed their usual coordinated victory dance much like the one they had come up with for when they were sealing the Jewel Seeds. Were the wolf not already confused by the point behind the whole dancing thing, she might've found the act cute. Fate watched in awe and some envy, perhaps hoping she could find something like that of her own that she can perform with Arf.

"Okay…" The wolf familiar decided to take the idiot bait and question her counterpart on the reasoning behind the poses, "What's with the dancing?"

"It's customary to have an awesome and catchy jingle after a boss fight" Sonic answered with a smirk, "You didn't know that already?"

"Forget I asked" Arf sighed; she wasn't in the mood to argue with her counterpart.

"Huh? What's this?" Nanoha took notice of the green gemstone that Eggman had dropped in his hasted. Curious, she picked it up in her hands, wincing a little at the power she could feel, "I can feel its power."

"That might be what Eggman was after" Sonic noted, "It kinda looks similar to a Chaos Emerald"

"Chaos Emerald?" Fate asked curiously, obviously feeling the statement going over her head.

"Later." Sonic was quick to dismiss the question, "We better get going. We have no idea what could happen next."

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: "Collision Chaos" Zone]<br>[Local Time: 0825 hours]  
>[BGM: "Collision Chaos ~Present" Sonic CD (JPEU)]**

One time jump and quick trek later found Sonic, Nanoha, Fate and Arf in the pink and blue themed Casino zone overlooking the psychedelic mechanized forest. Perhaps it was the aura that came with most casinos, but Nanoha and Sonic couldn't help but have the feeling that they were a little bit too young to be in such a place. Arf and Fate shared that feeling, to an extent, though they knew that there wasn't much that could be done.

"Not sure what to make of this one" Sonic commented idly as they began to walk. Luckily, neither he nor the others had to really come up with any thoughts about the scenery as a familiar voice caught there attention.

"Aha! I found you, Sonic!" The voice, much to the chagrin of the others, belonged to none other than Amy Rose.

"Here we go again…" Sonic grumbled as he and the others watched Amy catch up to them, thankfully she had refrained from trying one of her glomps like last time. The fact that the pink hedgehog may or may not have been intimidated by Arf's form might've been a factor as well.

"It's about time I caught up to you" The pink hedgehog stated as she dusted off her skirt of dirt, "You just left me there all alone last time…"

"Could you blame us?" Arf huffed in growing annoyance, "You glomp the heck out of blue boy and then you tried to go after his friend with a hammer."

"I'm sorry about that, Nanoha-san…" Amy, reminded of the bad impression she left on the group in the first place, turned and gave a polite curtsy to the aforementioned white-clad girl. Although, she still had a stern glare in her direction in doing so.

"Um… it's fine" Nanoha found herself sweat-dropping a little in anime style over the sudden turn around, "It was just a misunderstanding."

"I still don't get the whole "master" part." The pink hedgehog scratched her head a bit, keeping a stern glance at Nanoha, "Could someone explain it?"

"That information is kinda sensitive" Nanoha tried to dodge the question, aiding in her efforts with a confident assertion, "Sonic-kun isn't a slave; he's more like a dear friend to me"

"Uh-huh…" the glare eased up as Amy had found herself overthinking the statement a little, perhaps starting to see the girl-in-white as a rival of sorts.

The moment of peace was sadly short lived as from up ahead rushed a blur of yellow and blue. In a flash of speed that most definitely would've challenged Sonic's, the blur went for Amy Rose and snared her.

"Kyaa!" The pink hedgehog struggled to break free of the hold on her. The struggles forced her would-be captor to slow down and reveal himself for all to see.

The new adversary was robotic in nature, and it looked disturbingly similar to Sonic. The robot's legs, arms and head were painted a shade of blue almost exactly like the hedgehogs and had its feet painted red to resemble the shoes. The robot's eyes were red and it had a sharp pointed nose and matching silver muzzle over the mouth.

"Oy! Metallic knockoff!" Sonic bared his swords, "Drop the girly and you won't get sliced up!"

The robot gave its non-metallic counterpart a once-over in a glance before snapping its fingers to signal the appearance of reinforcements. The would-be kidnapper was not alone as from out of nowhere almost appeared a diverse wave of green mantis and lady-bug themed robots. Each of them ready to strike at any time; and they all had covered the escape of the kidnapper robot.

"HELP MEEEEEE!" Amy cried futilely as she was dragged off into the distance.

"Oy! Get back he-… Whoa!" Whatever Sonic had meant to say, he was cut off as he had to jump back to avoid the blades of one of the mantis robots; the hedgehog groaned as he held his blades in a defensive stance, "Great... we're too late!"

"They're trying to box us in…" Nanoha noted as she noticed the robots starting to spread out in a narrowing circle around the four.

"Numbers won't win a battle" Fate noted with little emotion as she readied Bardiche

"We can take them" Arf added, growling a little in her own feral excitement

"_**Thunder Rage"**_ A mechanical male voice said in a baritone that was similar, but somewhat lighter than that of Bardiche. The sudden interruption held Sonic and the others silent in confusion.

One-by-one; most of the robots were held in place by lightning and then subsequently demolished by the powerful thunderous boom from the lightning. There were a few stragglers that survived the initial area-of-effect spell, but they were soon fated to join the scrap heap as a small blonde girl rushed in from whatever hiding spot she chose. Without so much as a second to waste, the girl demolished the rest of the robots with what appeared to be a paper fan in her left hand.

"And stay down, rust buckets!" The blonde huffed in a voice that sounded almost like Fate's; albeit with more enthusiasm and energy. She huffed a little and placed the paper fan over her left shoulder, revealing the star emblem on the face.

Nanoha, Sonic and Arf stared at the girl in surprise while Fate quickly took to hiding behind her wolf familiar. Her reasoning was understood by the trio as the blonde in front of them resembled Fate so much, albeit a little bit shorter and a slightly different hairstyle. What really set the nerves of Fate into overdrive was the familiar recognition to the blonde in front of her from memory.

"Alicia…" Fate said softly; though evidently not soft enough as her voice drew the aforementioned blonde to look in their direction.

"That's my name, Alicia Testarossa" The blonde, confirming her identity as Alicia, glanced suspiciously at the group in front of her. The white-clad mage and blue hedgehog she had already pegged for mage and familiar. The orange wolf looked like one from the packs back on Mid-Childa; but it was the girl attempting to hide her presence that caught her attention the most.

"Judging from your outfits and devices, I assume you're from the Bureau." Alicia, deciding to momentarily let the presence of the other blonde slide for a moment, approached the group of mages, "If I'm right, then the world above us is most likely an administrated one, correct?"

"You're 1-for-2." Sonic, taking the level-headed and neutral approach, answered the blonde's question, "The Bureau kinda sent us, but apparently Earth, the world attached to this planet isn't administrated."

"Alright, well I think the next part of this would be introductions, but seeing as the cute blonde trying to hide herself behind the Mid-Childan wolf already knows me; I think it's your turn." Alicia sent a cute, teasing wink in the direction of the aforementioned duo, eliciting a cute blush from the latter blonde. Sure, she was a little bit suspicious, but she wasn't an idiot, knowing that if she tried anything, she wouldn't succeed as she was outnumbered.

"Nanoha" said brunette bowed in her customary greeting, "Takamachi Nanoha"

"Sonic the Hedgehog" The blue hedgehog introduced himself next, "Nanoha's familiar and apparently little brother."

"Arf" The large wolf said with a guarded expression as she held a slight defensive stance.

"Fate…" Fate's soft admission was just slightly loud enough to be caught as she peeked her head from behind Arf's body, slowly revealing herself to the girl she was cloned from, "Fate Testarossa."

'_Whoa! She looks just like me!'_ Alicia thought to herself as she started to circle around the latter blonde. Curiosity overpowering any suspicion, Alicia sized up the slightly taller blonde. She took note of the awkward and shy demeanor. She could see the nervousness and guarded expression worn by Fate as well. Perhaps it was her own energetic demeanor, but Alicia was unable to contain her excitement and before anyone could react, she glomped Fate and clung onto her rather cutely.

"CUTE!" Alicia squealed a bit energetically, enjoying the looks of surprise from everyone else and the atomic-red blush from the target of her glomp. Crimson eyes stared into nearly identical crimson eyes as Alicia gazed at Fate's face with enthusiasm, "I'm making you my little sister!"

Arf was held speechless while Sonic and Nanoha could barely suppress their giggles at the cuteness of the scene that developed. For Nanoha and Sonic, any worries they had felt for Fate were put at ease when the taller blonde didn't refuse the physical contact. As for Arf, she had absolutely no idea what to think; on one paw, she was almost tempted to lunge at Alicia in protectiveness, but at the same time, she could feel no malice behind the shorter blonde's actions.

Fate was confused completely, but there was something about Alicia that made her unwilling to resist the hug and declaration. Her only worries were that Alicia might have refused to accept her on the first impression, but found those quashed when she saw the enviable enthusiasm and energetic personality that she had known to remember.

"I am curious about why you look like me though" Alicia admitted, figuring she'd better hear the explanation right away, "And if you're using my family name, how Mother is doing..."

"That's…." Fate admitted softly, hanging her head in shame, "A long story…"

"We have all the time in the world here" Alicia countered, "How's about this, we'll trade stories as we go"

"Go?" Sonic cut in, "You're fighting Eggman too?"

"Eggman… that's the fat idiot's name?" the smaller blonde giggled, "I was going to call him Baldy McNosehair"

"Baldy McNosehair?!" Sonic couldn't hold back his chuckles, "Why didn't I think of that one?!"

'_Oh no….'_ Nanoha, Arf and even Fate shared the collective thought when they saw the shared look that Sonic and Alicia had.

"At any rate, we better get going;" Alicia was quick to change gears, turn tail and stretch a little in preparation, "I for one will not sit on my butt while this guy's trying to invade my home."

"Alright!" The blue hedgehog smirked in excitement, "Let's go!"

Alicia Testarossa has joined the party!

**[To be continued!]**

**[End of Main Chapter]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Omake: Fate's test]<strong>

Cue back to the aftermath of Nanoha and Fate's last battle over the Jewel Seeds. A barely conscious Fate, after enduring the Starlight Breaker of her rival, floated in the ocean almost lifelessly. Nanoha, concerned for her rival's wellbeing, flew down into the water and saved her from drowning.

Fate, having just woke up from her unconscious state, looked around and realized the reality of her situation. She had just lost in an honorable mage duel. Part of her was ashamed for the defeat, but there was another aspect of her that held opposing feelings.

'_I, as a member of the Testarossa family lost to another mage in a duel'_ The implications started to make Fate blush as less-than-innocent thoughts ran through her head, _'I must now be her wife!'_

"Um…" Nanoha innocently waved her hand over the latter blonde's face, "Fate-chan?"

"…." Fate fell silent before taking to the air once more, though she stopped and sent a neutral expression that was betrayed by her crimson blush, "You pass"

"Eh?!" the statement not only went over Nanoha's head, it left her confused and she found Fate trying to leave before she could catch up, "W-what do you mean?"

What did Fate mean indeed?

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step]**

**[End of Chapter 17]**

* * *

><p>Author's footnotes<p>

(1): Arisa Bunnings is Alisa Bannings; I went with the name change after reading a Nanoha INNOCENT card that had that name correction

(2) Arthra is the Asura; it was Romanized as A-Su-Ra, but in katakana

For the actual notes, Yes! Alicia is back... Only I'm using the INNOCENT persona of her for the appearance of her Barrier Jacket and Device... Lucky Star is the device name and also the reference to a rather funny school life anime, appropriately enough. When I first introduced Alicia in Knight of the Night Sky, I found that I was rather lacking in displaying that energetic persona that was Alicia Testarossa's personality. This time around I tried to play it out as such. This is the same Alicia that disappeared way back when. And I'm going to use the Little Planet arc partly as a means to allow Alicia and Fate to form a sisterly bond with one another when the situation is right.

At any rate, Metal Sonic and Amy Rose are played out in canon... I have no intention of bashing or vilifying Amy, as while Amy did go after Nanoha, she was misunderstanding the context behind Fate's explanation.

Alright! That's it... Read, review, yadda yadda yadda.. Sorry for the long delay, had to deal with my sister's wedding... Ziplining in a tux was AWESOME!


	18. Chapter 18

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in the second part of the Little Planet arc. The first part went well; I was kinda worried it would look too much like my Night Sky version, thankfully it didn't. Let's keep that trend going in this chapter.

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: "Collision Chaos" Zone]<br>[Local time: 0835 hours]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

After the addition of Alicia Testarossa to the party on Little Planet, the kids plus hedgehog and wolf familiars spent a good portion of around 10 minutes trading stories. As promised, Alicia would talk about how she ended up on Little Planet. Fate, albeit with a lot of understandable reluctance, had somehow managed to talk about her backstory, although she felt extremely self-conscious afterwards. Nanoha and Sonic had talked briefly about the Jewel Seed incident that brought them all together.

For Alicia, she had disclosed a brief retelling of how she ended up on Little Planet. As it turned out, just as the explosion from her mother's lab had engulfed the house, Alicia was caught up in a time warp of sorts and had woken up in the Palmtree Panic zone. At first, she was scared and understandably so, but as time went on for her she adapted to the new world's lifestyle and had taken to calling it her home.

Along the way, she had self-taught all of the spells she could think of and inherited from her family. She had utilized the technology of a zone known as the Wacky Workbench (in which she had promised to show them along their trip) to create a device, to which she gave the name "Lucky Star". Her drawback, though, was in her adaptation, she had trained herself in magic, but lacked any formal way of instruction that Fate had, so she was barely any better than Nanoha in that regard.

As she had finished her story first, she kept silent to listen to the tale of Nanoha, Sonic and how they got caught up in the Jewel Seed incident. In all honesty, she held nothing but respect for the white-clad girl and her familiar, and it wasn't just for the effort they had taken to reach out to their rivals. She admired their resolve and refusal to give in when others might've thrown in the towel. Their personalities, despite being so different, were so much alike in the way of morals. Alicia also couldn't stop herself from giggling at the cute moments the pair had made; from Sonic's reaction to his technical older sister embarrassing him to Nanoha's attempts of sneaking glances at Fate.

Speaking of Fate, Alicia had felt there was a reason why her new little sister was the last to recount her story. After hearing the story of her "clone", she couldn't blame her. She was also skeptical at first, but understandably so. It was only the agreeing nods from the other three that had cemented the truthfulness of Fate's story. Still, that didn't mean Alicia had liked the story,

"So let me get this straight." The smaller blonde stated, getting a slight headache from the massive amounts of info she was getting. "Fate is actually a "clone" of me, and was used to collect these Lost Logia known as "Jewel Seeds" in order to get to Al Hazard; and all of this was just because Mother couldn't get over my apparent death?"

"Yeah…" Fate was the first to speak in confirmation; her soft voice was backed up by the nods of the other three, "I understand if you don't want to believe me. You're hearing about your mother in a negative light."

"Our mother can be an idiot sometimes" The way that Alicia pluralized the possession was missed by Fate, but caught by the latter trio of the group, "Slow to catch onto things, I bet it's only recently that she remembered her promise."

"Promise?" the taller blonde queried, she could briefly remember the idea of one from the cloned memories, but they were still all jumbled up and a tad unreliable.

"Before the accident, she had asked me what my birthday wish was" Alicia could still fondly recall that specific memory, the peaceful picnic, "I embarrassed her by asking for a little sister"

Sonic, Nanoha and Arf were completely surprised by that sudden revelation. Fate, on the other hand, was confused and fearful. Confused because of the uncertainty behind that reveal, and fearful for being rejected; the confusion was recent, but the fear was present since she first saw Alicia.

"I'm going to have a little word with our Mother the next time I see her, if only to knock some sense into her, but there is one thing I'm grateful for." Without missing a beat, Alicia once again tackle-hugged the taller blonde and clung to her, "She gave me the most adorable little sister I could ask for!"

"Huh?" Fate was even more confused and even more self-conscious, "Y-you don't mind that I'm a clone? And a fai-"

"Finish that sentence and I'll introduce you to the Paper Fan Slash" Alicia quickly interjected, her left hand, which was caressing her taller clone's back, had brandished the aforementioned paper fan, "I don't care if you're my clone. I said I will make you my little sister, and I will."

"Ah…" more stunned silence from Fate. Her surprised face turned an even cuter shade of pink when the smaller blonde decided to have a little fun and chaste kissed her on the cheek. Eventually, Fate settled for a small "Thank you…"

"Anyways, it's time to get back to saving the world and stuff" Alicia, surprising everyone again, swung her mood from the caring to the energetically cheerful, "Follow me everyone"

With barely a minute to allow the statement to settle in, the others took note that Alicia was almost out of sight before they ran on ahead to catch up. Needless to say, the current adventure had taken an interesting twist.

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 18<br>From a Tutorial in Chaos to Roll Tide**

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: Collision Chaos]<br>[BGM: "Collision Chaos ~Present" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

"Alright, everyone; this is the start of our adventure!" Alicia's enthusiasm was enough to brighten up the atmosphere, not that much of it was needed, "But first, I will go under the assumption that none of you know how this place works, so it falls to yours truly to give out a Tutorial"

"Tutorial…" Sonic giggled a little in amusement, a feeling that was shared by his attached mage.

"Am I missing something here?" Alicia, knowing an inside joke when she sees one, felt the urge to ask about it, "Something that could be shared with the rest of the class?"

"Nothing…" Sonic almost musically chimed out, "But the last person who gave us a Tutorial was a ferret."

"I can give the tutorial in nothing but my underwear and a set of fake ferret ears and tail if you want" Alicia swore that was a joke on her behalf, but the blushing reactions she got from 3 of the 4 plus were just priceless, "I'm kidding. Just follow me"

Having quickly shaken off the idea of pantie-clad ferret girl cosplay provided by the smaller of the Testarossa blondes, the group progressed through the zone. The bug-themed robots were a nuisance but easily dispatched. Alicia didn't need to give the other mages a tutorial about that. There was one thing that bothered her, though, but she kept it quiet until they arrived at the first major part of the tutorial, which was a sign that had the word "past" engraved on it.

"Alright everyone" Alicia gestured to the recently discovered sign, "Anyone know what this is?"

"A sign?" Sonic deadpanned.

"Not just any sign my dear novices. These are…" The shorter blonde paused for a moment, and made a cute little moment of trying to figure out the name of the sign, "Actually I don't know the name, but whatever, these are still special signs. They allow you to travel through time."

"Won't we need a flux capacitor for that?" Sonic cutely quipped, though only Nanoha got the joke.

"You just had to say that…" it took less than a few seconds for Nanoha to regain her composure, sending a half-hearted glare in her familiar's direction

"Meh" the hedgehog shrugged, "Couldn't resist"

"Moving on!" The impatience of the shorter blonde was eerily similar to the blue hedgehog, "Like I was saying, these signs allow you to travel through time. This sign, as its read, allows you to travel to the past of the current zone. The time zones are relevant, so you won't be able to travel further into the past or future at any time.

"There are 3 time zones for each main zone" Alicia continued, "Past, Present (which we're in) and the Future. Baldy McNosehair figured this out when he got here and had the smart idea to plant some weird devices that cause those robots to appear. I took out one of those in the Past of the Palm tree zone already, so we don't need to worry about that."

"So aside from making more robots appear here, what else do that do?" Sonic asked.

"Well they establish the old guy's rule over a zone. And the future changes to fit his image" The shorter blonde responded, "Take out the devices and he'll lose control. And the future returns to what it should be"

"Change the past, influence the future" Lindy Harlaown interjected over a communication channel from the new base in Uminari, surprising just about everyone there with her appearance, "I don't believe I've seen it in a literal context"

"Lindy-san" Nanoha almost jumped, she would most likely prefer that the woman refrain from scaring her, "How long have you been listening?"

"Since you arrived" The woman answered, implying that she had seen it all, from the arrival to Alicia's appearance. Lindy's attention shifted to the aforementioned short blonde, "Looks like the Bureau was correct in not assuming your demise."

"So the cute brunette, her hedgehog, my clone and her dog are all sent by you?" Alicia was quick to assume, drawing a cute blush from the aforementioned Nanoha. The short blonde had drawn the conclusion from assuming that the woman on the communication was an authority figure.

"Yes, I am Lindy Harlaown, an admiral from the TSAB." Lindy nodded in confirmation, introducing herself along the way, "I sent them here to investigate this world and stop the nefarious plot of Doctor Eggman before he endangers lives not only on this planet, but potentially others."

"If you were listening in on our conversations before, why didn't you chime in earlier?" Alicia's was still skeptical, but nonetheless respectful towards this woman, "You could've said something earlier when we were trading stories."

"Part of this deployment was to test Nanoha-san and Fate-san's abilities to work together and adapt to a situation; I'm not going to hold their hand throughout the mission" The woman explained, "I had only called in with an update on Precia. They had just confirmed her arrival on Mid-Childa and should begin the process to get a trial together."

"Thank you…" Fate thanked the woman softly, ever so grateful to hear about her mother.

"Alicia-san, it may be much to ask of you, but I'd like to request your assistance in this current case" The admiral had figured that she didn't need to ask, but it was better to be air on the side of caution, "Will that be alright?"

"I was going to do it anyway." Alicia shrugged, "This place is my home, and I won't let anyone harm it. And if these guys want to help, orders or not, then who am I to stop them?"

"I figured you'll see reason" The woman smiled. "I look forward to meeting you in person, until then, I'll leave you all to your adventure."

The feed soon cut off from there. Everyone was left in silence for a slight moment until Nanoha queried on how to use the sign. The apparent guide wasn't quite sure of the specifics, but she noted that the signs were apparently run on speed. The faster the person or group that passed through the sign were, the sooner they'd make the jump.

"I think we accidentally used one of the signs already" Sonic noted, "Back in the previous zone, we were trying to outrun a pink hedgehog"

"She get to your patience too?" Alicia seemed to know who was being referred to, "I hauled her pink tail out of a pinch with a few of those robots earlier. She was going on about meeting some sort of prophesized destined one or something"

A brief silence fell upon the group before Arf reminded that they had strayed off topic from the situation at hand. A recurring theme, but nonetheless it was troublesome. With the combination of Sonic, Fate and Alicia's speed, the group sped through the "Past" sign and was engulfed in a flash of light that signified a time warp.

* * *

><p><strong>[Collision Chaos –Past]<br>[BGM: "Collision Chaos ~Past" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

They had appeared at around the same area of when they made the jump, but the scenery was vastly different. In the present, the zone had a casino overlooking the forest, but here the casino appeared to still be in construction. The forest seemed to perfectly mix with the construction, and with the big casino out of the way, there was a breathtaking view of a lake.

"Pretty…" Nanoha couldn't help but stare in awe and amazement.

"Never get tired of this sight either" Alicia voiced her agreement, "But the future here is really breathtaking, granted we kick the old guy's influence out first"

With that, they progressed through the zone; their progression was much more difficult as the past held a lot more robots. As Fate had alluded to earlier, numbers didn't win any battles on their own, and the robots were no exception and fell victim to the mages speed and abilities. In no time at all, the group found the target of their time travelling.

The robot generating machine was a rather complex contraption. It consisted of two metallic parts held between streams of electrical energy. The contraption was armored, but its defenses couldn't hold a candle to Precia's mechanicals if one was to compare, and Fate had a subtle one at that.

With the generator destroyed, thus nearly guaranteeing a good future, the four deployed mages had assumed it as high time to return to the present, but Alicia was quick to tell them otherwise. The short blonde had one other thing that bothered her and she had noticed there was one in the Palm tree zone as well so there was a high chance that one would be found in the casino.

The thing, rather object, in question, turned out to be a projector left behind by none other than Doctor Eggman. The projector displayed the same metallic look-a-like of Sonic stomping his metallic foot on a poor, defenseless animal. It was scary, no doubt, but also quite infuriating for some.

"Here I thought Eggman was low…" Sonic almost growled out, "But this is something else"

"I overheard the old geezer ordering his mooks to place one of these projectors in the past of every zone." Alicia's expression almost mirrored the blue hedgehog, "Apparently they were to inspire fear among the critters."

"How cruel…" Nanoha felt pity for the poor guys while Fate silently nodded in agreement.

"Well I'm inspired alright" There was almost a feral feeling to Arf's tone as she crushed the projector with a paw. She, like Sonic were animals, not just familiars and their kindred feelings were quite understandable, both she and the blue hedgehog were ticked, "Inspired to kick this old bastard's ass."

"I'd say "down girl" but then I'd be a hypocrite" Sonic, sure enough, was close to losing his short temper.

"It's already dealt with, let's move on before tempers really flare" Nanoha, mentally quipping to herself about suddenly being the voice of reason, somehow managed to calm the tempers of the resident animal familiars.

With all said and done, the group continued on through the casino zone. The robot numbers dwindled with the generator destroyed in the zone, but that didn't make for much smooth sailing. Time jumps were aplenty as they took a Future sign to the present and then to the future.

* * *

><p><strong>[Collision Chaos –Future]<br>[BGM: "Collision Chaos ~Good Future" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

The future, as stated by Alicia, was quite the sight to see. The zone was half-casino and half-utopia with the casino being futuristic and inviting. That said, a fair majority of the youth still felt they were too young for such a place. Alicia didn't, but there was no way the others of the new "party" were going to let her go in and waste time. That; and the short blonde may have been a little overly exuberant to showcase the casino.

Much like the good future of the previous zone, the casino zone was devoid of any robots, merely replaced by the cute, cuddly critters that called Little Planet home. With the lake from the past still visible, the mages whom haven't seen it could now attest for its purity and beauty.

From there, the trek was pretty much straightforward. The only real obstacle that proved to be troublesome was the apparent pinball design of the last area of the zone. Sonic and Alicia sure had a blast with it, but the same couldn't be said for the rest of the group. Nanoha and Fate were both looking rather nauseous by the end of it, while Arf just didn't see the point.

The last part of the aforementioned tutorial "level", as Sonic had taken to calling it, involved the group stopping at a clearing. Rather, it was the blue hedgehog who had told them all to stop as they had arrived at said clearing. Arf and Fate both had a sinking feeling already considering the last time this situation came up, Nanoha all but said it.

"Pardon me, Cute Tutorial Girl." Sonic called to Alicia, chuckling a little at the new nickname he had coined the aforementioned blonde, "But I believe this is the part of the tutorial where we fight some sort of boss, no?"

"You have a point there, but I don't see anything set up here" The short blonde noted, "And Lucky Star hasn't picked up any other humanoids here except us. Sorry to disappoint."

"Odd, he almost always showed up in my first adventure." The blue hedgehog pondered pensively for a moment, "Same old thing; show up in a clearing with some boss-like robot contraption of his and I have to scrap it up."

"And he did the same in the last zone?" Alicia asked with some thought. Her answer was a nodding gesture from the others, which furthered her pensive thoughts, "Did he leave anything behind when you kicked his butt?"

"Well… he did leave this gemstone or something behind" Nanoha noted as she held out the aforementioned stone. She was completely blindsided when Alicia closed in on her and locked gazes, "Um…"

"Give it" Alicia held out her left hand, fully expecting the white-clad girl to hand over the gem, "Give me the Time Stone"

"Time Stone?" Nanoha was quick to recover from her brief moment of surprise. The others with her, aside from Alicia, were almost as confused as she was. She glanced at the gemstone she had recently produced from her inventory and allowed the gears to spin in her mind, "You mean this?"

"That is a Time Stone. One of the seven that allow this world its time travelling powers" The resident "guide" of Little Planet displayed how knowledgeable she was of her temporary home, "It is said that when one collects all of them, they will have control over time here."

"And how do you know that?" Sonic's skepticism showed briefly

"If you live here long enough, you'll pick up a few things" a simple shrug was Alicia's response. She produced a yellow version of the gemstone in her other hand, "Having one of these also helps"

The two gems gave off a subtle glow in recognition of one another, but that was all they did. The gems didn't seem to hold too much power on their own and while there was a slight power spike detected from the devices, there wasn't nearly enough to compare to the Lost Logias known as the Jewel Seeds. Sonic was silently grateful that these gems weren't as great as the Chaos Emeralds form South Island, otherwise there would've been a bigger chain reaction.

"I was eavesdropping on the old fart when he found out about these gems an hour or so ago" Alicia continued on, "His intention is to collect all of them to establish his rule over this world, convert it into something called "Eggmanland", then something about conquest. I toned him out after that."

"That's Eggman for you" Sonic shrugged, "All talk."

"That doesn't make him any less of a threat" Fate interjected softly, "Our mission is to stop him."

"I agree with my adorable little sister" Alicia gave an agreeing nod, grinning a little at the flushed reaction she got from the taller blonde, "Baldy McNosehair already has a head start on us though, he's got the other 5 Time Stones"

"And we'll probably have to fight him for them" Arf huffed in annoyance, she was starting to feel impatient over sitting around in one place for too long, "We've wasted enough time here already. Where's the next zone?"

"Tidal Tempest" came Alicia's reply as the aforementioned short blonde had caught the underlying tone of impatience. Far from offended, she was actually in agreement and felt her excitement rise up. Eager to continue the adventure and take any opportunity to get to know her new "little sister" better, Alicia turned to take point again, "This way"

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: Tidal Tempest –Present]<br>[BGM: "Tidal Tempest ~Present" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

Out of the group of youth who had admired the scenery of the labyrinth-like zone, only Sonic had less-than pleasant thoughts about the zone. The striking resemblance of this zone to that of the also underwater Labyrinth Zone on South Island had the poor hedgehog curled up against a nearby pillar, absolutely refusing to go down the ramp that led to the first submerged region of the zone. His female companions found the scene quite cute and funny, including Nanoha, despite understanding the reasoning for the fear.

"Uh…" Alicia, despite finding the hedgehog's antics cute and had to exercise all restraint she had to keep from gushing over said cuteness, felt concerned, "Is he going to be okay?"

"Yeah, just give him a minute" Nanoha giggled a little, "This zone kinda hit the familiarity mark a little too much"

"This isn't the first underwater labyrinth he's been in?" Arf, while finding her counterpart's actions cute, felt there was no way to compare with that of Fate's cute moments.

"Labyrinth" Sonic muttered somehow coherently, "South Island… can't swim… sunk like a rock"

"Well, have no fear, my blue friend" Alicia, energetically shifting her mood to a heroic one, "I have the means to make sure all of us get through this zone safely"

"Really?" Had Sonic not have had a moment of aquaphobia his tone would've been laced with more skeptical sarcasm than it had.

"Of course" Humility was definitely not one of Alicia's strong points, but she wasn't an overconfident sort either, at least not without something to support the confidence, "I have been practicing a spell for this area."

"A spell?" Fate's curiosity was gripped, as was Arf's, "What does it do?"

"I can create bubble-like barriers that will allow breathing underwater" Alicia briefly explained, "Not only that, but they'll allow those in the barriers to execute physical attacks without risk of breaking. I've tried them myself, so I would know. On the downside, these barriers are so sensitive; so much as one strike would take it out."

"Should we ask how you practiced that last detail out?" Arf couldn't help but ask.

"This world is too peaceful to have any real threats to practice off of" The blonde shrugged, "I had to improvise somehow."

"Sonic-kun, you shouldn't have to worry too much about the water now" Nanoha nonetheless addressed her familiar with a serious glance, "We put you on a strict diet for more than just your health and training. Maybe you haven't noticed, but you've been losing a lot of the unhealthy weight and fat that came from all of those chili dogs"

"Yeah, and I was finally able to swim thanks to your help back at the pool" Sonic nodded, though his tone also noted that there was another pressing issue, "The other problem is being underwater kinda saps the heck out of my speed"

"Well it would if you kept trying to run instead of swim" Alicia countered ever so instantly.

"Oh yeah" even Sonic had his moments of embarrassment and this one showed in a light pinking of his cheeks.

"Lucky Star?" Alicia called to her device, "The spell please"

"_**Aquatic Defenser Multi-target shift"**_ The gun in the girl's left hand declared, the voice it held was so familiar to Bardiche that some could've considered it to be the brother of Fate's device.

In no time at all, the five were each encased with bubble-like barriers. Alicia, with amusement and some pride in her features, watched as her companions walked around a little to test the mobility of the barriers. Sure enough, the barriers would move as they did, and when Sonic and Arf made practice melee swipes, the attacks would pass right through the barriers without them actually breaking.

"These barriers have an aquatic element" Fate noticed, to her own confusion, "I thought our family's element was based around lightning."

"I tried making a photon variant of this specific barrier" Embarrassment was evident in Alicia's features as she said this, "But for some reason it added a magnetic element, and that kinda got awkward in testing..."

"Say no more" Sonic, having found his spirits lightened, saved the short blonde from further embarrassment. He took second point right behind the blonde as they started down the incline that led into the water.

Five splashes later and the mages plus two familiar were inside the water. Sonic was ever so grateful for the swimming lessons courtesy of Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka, because were it not for them, he probably wouldn't have been able to keep up with the other four whom had better swimming skills.

Though the water did sap some of the speed, the group was still able to progress quite quickly through the first part of the zone. The pipelines channeling water through them were quite useful in the quick progression. The only real issue was building enough speed through the first Past sign. Thankfully the assistance of Nanoha's Flier Fin, combining with Sonic's fast legs doubling as propellers added to the natural high-speed from the other trio and they were able to burst right through the sign into the past.

* * *

><p><strong>[Tidal Tempest –Past]<br>[BGM: "Tidal Tempest ~P" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

The past was much more different from the present. The environment, untouched by mankind or machinery, consisted of dark caverns with the lower water level. As the water level was lower, the waters were much darker, but not in the malevolent context. Around the caverns were stone pillars and, oddly enough, the water pipes from the Present.

"We know our job here" Alicia said as the group landed, "Find the generator and destroy it."

"Watch out" Sonic cautioned as they started once more, "Eggman's robots are probably gonna try to stop us"

And run interference the robots tried to do. Eggman's selected theme of mechs for the Tidal zone strayed away from the bug themes of the previous two. Aside from the occasional dragonfly and insect-themed robots, the ones in the underwater cavern labyrinth included the aquatic theme crayfish and crab shaped mechs.

Thankfully, the dragonfly robots were above the surface so that, while they were more effective that way, the effectiveness worked for the mages two as they didn't have the water slowing them down in some areas. Soon they found the robot generator in question. The contraption was above water, which might have indicated Eggman's reluctance to hide it underwater.

Not that the placement mattered anymore, the generator was swiftly dealt with and the robots that spawned from it were destroyed in the chain reaction. It was the destruction of the recent generator that clued Alicia into what Eggman had used for the power source of his robots. While she was quite dazzled at the sight of seeing Little Planet's flowers bloom so freely, part of her wanted to know why.

"I see these flowers all the time back before the old guy showed up" Alicia, still refusing to even refer to the mastermind with his name, pondered the familiarity, "But lately they've gone missing and here they are again. Any particular reason?"

"Maybe because he's using the flowers to power up his machines" Sonic offered honestly, he wasn't trying to be rude or anything, just plain honesty, "The last time he used animals from South Island."

"That fat old…" Alicia soon found her mouth clamped shut by, surprisingly enough, Fate. The move was probably a good one, as the shorter blonde was most likely about to shout off a few expletives and such that would've broadened the vocabulary of the others more than it should have.

"Alicia-onee-san, calm down" The taller blonde, most likely out of instinct and to the surprise of the others, accidentally referred to her "original" as an older sibling. She probably didn't realize the slip for the moment, as she was focused on calming the high octane spirit of her original down, "We can beat him up later, and you're going to scare your comrades."

"Mou…" The shorter blonde pouted when her mouth was released, preferably before she had the idea of licking said hand. As fast as her temper could flare, it just as quickly quelled to pouting and internally hating Eggman's guts. A small smirk appeared on her face when she recalled what Fate just called her.

"Say…" Alicia's grin grew a bit wider in mischievous joy, "Did my ears deceive me or did you just call me 'Onee-san'?"

"A-ah…" Fate instantly flushed an adorable shade of crimson as she tried so hard to justify herself, "Um… I d-didn't mean to… I was just trying to calm you down and… and…"

"My adorable little sister is already learning!" Far from offended, Alicia was almost ecstatic. Her feelings may have come from the fulfillment of her childish, selfish desires, but they were genuine enough for the others, "Pinch me, I must be dreaming!"

"That can be arranged" Sonic cut in, sure his patience for the mushy and somewhat cheesy moments was vast due to spending a few months as the familiar to a girl prone to some of those moments, but even he had his limits, "We'll have plenty of time for this when we're done kicking Baldy Nosehair's fat butt off Little Planet."

"Fine…" Alicia relented with a somewhat overdramatic sigh of defeat.

Their progression through the past of the underwater labyrinth zone was straightforward; much like the one in Collision Chaos, baring the slight delay in making sure the Metal Sonic generator was destroyed. The robot resistance dwindled some more, though there were still a fair amount from the initial invasion.

As it was a recurring element, the time travel signs were important to their trek. They had jumped once again to the present. There was another delay in the adjustment to the higher water level, but still the jump to the Future was taken with no other pressing issue to address.

* * *

><p><strong>[Tidal Tempest –Future]<br>[BGM: "Tidal Tempest ~G" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

They landed in a fully operational, turquoise aquarium with many plants kept in hydroponic cases. The environment was mechanized, but much like the previous zone's Good Futures, it was a positive kind of mechanical. The four who hadn't seen this zone before had to take a moment to take in the pink polka-dotted ground design as it was rather disorienting.

The team progressed through the zone a bit. The biggest issue thus far was navigating through the corridors, but it was only a small delay in the long run. As they went through, Sonic was hit with another feeling of déjà vu. Eggman had taken to the "catch me if you can" approach with the underwater Labyrinth zone. Sonic was not so confident that Eggman had developed a sense of originality last time. Sure enough, Eggman had made his appearance in the middle of one of the caverns.

"Really Eggman?" Sonic grumbled out as he and the four with him stopped and confronted the doctor, "Can you get less original?"

"Ah, there you are" Eggman's tone suggested that he was almost expecting the group to confront him, "I was waiting for you to show up"

"Why am I not surprised?" Sonic asked somewhat in annoyance.

"I believe you have something that belongs to me" The doctor glared at the group, not really caring for the new addition of Alicia Testarossa as he was more focused with the items he was looking for, "Rather, two things, the Time Stones"

"Like we're going to just give them over, Baldy McNosehair" Alicia spat out, glaring at the doctor in barely contained fury.

"WHAT DID YOU CALL ME?!" Quick for a temper tantrum, Eggman returned the glare with one of his own, "I was going to ask nicely, but now you've forced my hand."

"So you wanna rumble?" Sonic challenged with a smirk, "I was about to ask if we should just skip the dialogue."

"I'll deal with you, but not here" The doctor had the good sense to look around and analyze the environment, "This area is far too constrained for us."

With that, the doctor turned tail and fled through the caverns. Needless to say, he was pursued by the mages. Unfortunately for him, he hadn't taken in mind the fact that he was dealing with mages with the affinities for shooting spells. That mistake had weakened his aerial motorbike far more than he had intended. Still, he was able to make it to a clearing underwater.

* * *

><p><strong>[VS: Eggman]<br>[BGM: "Battle" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

As soon as Eggman stopped, he pressed a button on his console. The motorbike was surrounded by a total of 16 large bubbles. The idea behind the shield was so that neither Sonic nor his allies could land a hit without being forced to breathe in air and also be repelled by the bubble bursting.

"O~ho-ho-ho-ho!" The doctor grinned almost manically, "Let's see you hit me now."

"This may actually be a problem" Alicia admitted with a grunt, "Our Photon spells will be counterproductive with the water."

"Not to worry" Nanoha sounded overly optimistic, most likely rightfully so, "Sonic-kun and I can take care of them."

"_**Divine Shooter!"**_ Raising Heart chimed in agreement as Nanoha ascended up into the water until she was almost eye level with the man.

"Do you really think you can take…" Eggman's confidence slowly started to drain as he took notice of the 16 pink spheres that surrounded the pre-teen girl in white, "me… on… oh crap"

"Shoot!" Nanoha declared with a thrust of her left hand. Normally her limit on the spell was 5 or so with control. However, as she was allowed to sacrifice power for numbers, she could easily control the spheres she created.

The volley of the Divine Shooter was unleashed at such a rapid pace that left Eggman with no room to even attempt to dodge. One by one, each shooter round had cancelled out the bubbles that the mad scientist had created for his own protection. As Nanoha had intentionally underpowered her Divine Shooter to increase her numbers, the rounds had dissipated upon impact with the bubbles.

"H-hey!" Eggman slammed his console with childish rage.

"You're up. Sonic-kun!" Nanoha declared to her familiar as she descended, passing the metaphorical baton to her familiar.

"Got it!" Sonic grinned in response as he ascended up into the water until he was within the melee Cross Range with the doctor's motorbike. The only real drawback was that he couldn't swim that well, but all he needed to do was use his feet to keep a solid float in the water.

"Oh…" Defenseless, Eggman could only sit there and watch as his blue hedgehog bared the twin kodachi blades, "Double crap…"

"Can you swim?" The hedgehog asked rhetorically as he wound up and sliced straight through the motorbike with his twin swords. The bike was literally sliced in half horizontally, separating the half that had Eggman on it from the bottom.

"AAAAAAAH!" the sudden force of the cleaving created a small explosion that was powerful enough to send a screaming Eggman sky-high and well out of the Tidal Tempest zone.

* * *

><p><strong>[Boss Neutralized]<br>[Jingle: "Round Clear" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

Sonic and Nanoha coordinated a cute little victory dance as the water level started to lower. The two finished with matching grins and "v for victory" signs with their hands as the water leveled lowered to the point where it was just at their feet. Their actions, while cute, drew a curious glance from Alicia.

"Okay, I'll bite" the shorter blonde let the curiosity influence her, "The poses are cute, but what's the point of them?"

"It's absolutely customary to have a victory pose after a boss beating" Sonic answered without missing a beat, "That and music! But we're still working on that"

"Yeah…" Nanoha felt her cheeks heat up briefly in embarrassment, "I don't want to rely on my cellphone again"

"Hmm…" Alicia absorbed the new information and allowed her mind to do some work. Perhaps she could try to coordinate something like that with her new little sister. A quick glance at Fate's direction clued the shorter blonde into the idea that her sibling had watched the victory celebration with growing curiosity.

'_This could be fun…'_ a mischievous grin had found its home on Alicia's face once again as she watched.

"Found something!" Arf interrupted the musing when she searched the wreckage of the downed Egg-mobile and found the cyan blue Time Stone in its wreck. The wolf held the gem in her paw with interest. "Is this one of the Time Stones?"

"Yeah" Alicia snapped out of her phase to confirm the familiar's question. She didn't quite feel like wrestling the wolf for the Time Stone this time. In fact, she probably felt that she owed the other girl she tried that to an apology, but decided to let that non-issue sit for a while.

"3 down" Sonic counted out, "4 to go. Not bad"

"I'll say" Alicia nodded, "We're making a pretty good team so far."

"Still have a long way to go" Nanoha noted, "Let's continue on"

With 3 of the 7 Time Stones secured, the heroes were off to a great start to their adventure. As Alicia gets used to having new friends and comrades to help her out, Fate was slowly getting used to the idea of having someone to call a sibling. Will this quickly-formed friendship last or blow up in smoke? Only time will tell.

**[To be continued]**

**[End of Main Chapter]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Omake: Alicia's Test]<strong>

Alicia Testarossa had silently listened to the retelling of the Jewel Seed incident, including the rather adorable moment of friendship that bloomed between Nanoha and Fate. She was quite open-minded and had a feeling that the friendship had romantic potential; however, before she could confirm such a feeling, she had to be sure of something.

'_If Nanoha's going to be so romantic with my little sister, I have to make sure she'll fit the criteria'_ Alicia thought to herself as she closed in on the white-clad mage, starting intently at her, _'She must pass my test before I bless her as a potential sister in-law.'_

"Um… Alicia-san?" Nanoha politely asked, quite confused with the shorter blonde's close proximity with her, "Is something the matter?"

"Hmmm…" Alicia scrutinized the form of the brunette in white. Cute, polite on the first impression, the blonde was impressed first. A glance in Fate's direction had confirmed to the shorter blonde that Fate had a fondness for the girl in question as well.

"Alright! You pass!" Alicia declared loudly. Surprising Nanoha and Sonic completely, while Arf and Fate had a lingering idea what the context behind the shorter Testarossa blonde had in mind. Sure enough, the suspicions were confirmed when Alicia declared even louder, "You can now be my Sister-in-law!"

"EH?!" Nanoha and Sonic gawked while Fate felt her face go crimson in the thoughts.

'_Oh here we go…'_ Arf grumbled in thought.

Does every Testarossa female wish to see Nanoha bedded or married?

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 18]<strong>

Author's Note: Sorry for the delay. I kinda got sidetracked with my new game... Lightning Returns... plus parents were in Hawaii for a business thing my dad had… lucky punks! So my time was even more limited, but here it is now. Another update! Oh! References galore here.. can you name them all? Sports, movies, you name it.. GO!


	19. Chapter 19

SonicANIME2010 here with another chapter to the Little Planet arc of Lyrical Familiar. Not too much to really go on about here, just a couple more zones and some more info about Alicia.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari City, Japan]  
>[Residential District, Harlaown Residence]<br>[Local Time: 0905 hours]  
>[BGM: "Kizuna, shinjite" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Lindy Harlaown was a woman of many talents; single (widowed) mother of one teenage boy, admiral of an inter-stellar military police, and quite perceptive with a good judge of character. However, none of these had come with the foresight to even think about how quickly her recently-established base on Earth would be tested.

The woman, along with her enforcer/son Chrono and the information expert/talented subordinate, Amy Limietta were situated in the small, but workable situation room that was designed from the Arthra's bridge. The room used to be an office suite, but the mages had spent the good part of last night converting the room to suit their official needs.

"Status update" Lindy requested of her information expert,

"All scanners are operational" The teen brunette replied, "And I think you already know how the communication systems are working."

"I still can't believe how things have turned out in the past hour" Chrono noted as he stood behind the resident tech, "Are we absolutely sure of the identity of our newest 'Ally'?"

"For the tenth time, I can't say for sure" Amy huffed as she felt a little annoyed over the young enforcer's repeated questioning, "Her story would appear to match up and her magic signature is similar to that of Fate's and Precia's, but she's a lot younger than what any of us would expect her to be.

"In addition, we can't verify beyond that unless we've run some tests" The brunette added, "And we can't do that unless she's here"

"Still, her presence here is quite coincidental." Lindy adopted a pose of pensive thought, "We arrest Precia Testarossa and close out the Jewel Seed incident, only to encounter the girl who could possibly be the missing biological daughter of that same woman on the very next incident."

"I'm not so sure I feel comfortable with calling this off as some big coincidence" Chrono admitted his own take.

"Perhaps this chain of events was prophesized" The older woman noted in thought, "I seem to recall a certain member of the Saint Church rising through the ranks with her skill for predictions"

"We can't seriously put too much stock towards that though" Chrono countered, "She said herself that the predictions were about 'as useful as a fairly accurate horoscope' and widely open for speculation."

"Perhaps, but she might be one of the parties interested in the report we file after the completion of this incident" While Lindy had concurred with her son's argument, she wasn't so close-minded as to dismiss the idea either, "Let's see how this one turns out."

"They're moving on" Amy interjected as she closely monitored the position movement of the deployed mages, "I believe this is the fourth zone their approaching"

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 19<br>Mines and Workbenches**

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: "Quartz Quadrant"]<br>[Local Time: 0910 hours]  
>[BGM: "Quartz Quadrant (Present)" Sonic CD (JPNEU)]**

The next zone was an aqua-colored mine full of technology. In the brief overview of the zone, Alicia explained that the machinery of the zone was designed to extract crystals, fittingly quartz crystals, and processed them on conveyor belts and platforms. Some of the quartz was to be transferred to other zones while the rest were just lying around.

The group of five stayed in a close formation with Nanoha, Alicia and Fate taking to the skies while Sonic and Arf stayed to the ground. The blue hedgehog ran in his usual finger-eight pattern, but had kept a solid pace that was slow enough for the others to keep up with, but still remarkably fast.

"I take it this zone was named because of the crystals here?" Sonic was the first to provide the educated guess to connect the dots, "The quartz?"

"Correct" Alicia confirmed the connection, "I've used this mine mainly for materials that I built my device from"

"What else did you build here?" Nanoha, feeling rather curious, asked an innocent enough question.

"I built a "lair" in the zone after this one, but I only use it for some of my more technological experiments" The shorter blonde shrugged, "It's not much, and the only big accomplishment I made was Lucky Star"

"Anything to watch out for here?" Fate asked, "Aside from the enemy robots, I mean"

"The conveyor belts are really effective and can change direction on a dime." Alicia noted, pointing to the mentioned contraptions, "We'll have to use them at some point too because these mines can get pretty narrow no matter which time zone we're in."

Sure enough, Alicia's words proved true as when Sonic and Arf had set foot on the first conveyor belt, they were almost thrown off balance as the belt was moving in the opposite direction of their trek, making it a fairly effective treadmill of sorts. Luckily, Alicia knew the way to control the direction of the belt. It was the increased speed from the belts that made the jump to the Past quite easier when they blurred past the sign.

**[Quartz Quadrant –Past]  
>[BGM: "Quartz Quadrant (Past) Sonic CD (JPNEU)]**

Much like the past of the previous zones, Quartz Quadrant's past was devoid of a majority of machinery, aside from a few useless conveyor belts. The color scheme of the caverns went from aqua to green, giving off a rather peaceful vibe. With the absence of most of the machinery, the view of the caverns opened up to a swamp and forestry area near the bottom of the zone.

"If it's not too much trouble, do you guys mind if I ask you something?" Alicia asked of the group; there was one nagging question she had bugging at the back of her mind since she joined up.

"Shoot" Sonic answered to the flying blonde, never breaking from his solid stride.

"What year is it?" The small blonde asked, quite seriously too, "I've kinda lost track"

"Uh…" Nanoha wasn't entirely sure how to answer that question, mainly because she wasn't aware if the Bureau or Mid-Childa had operated under a different calendar than her and Sonic's world, "I don't know if I can answer that"

"2006(1)?" Sonic offered, "Not so sure how you guys count years, but that's kinda what it is over here"

"0065(2)" Fate answered in clarification. She was, thankfully so, a little bit more understanding of the context, having lived a majority of her life by the same calendar.

"0065, huh… Let's see…" Alicia started to do the math in her head, "I was born in the year 0034, the accident that got me here happened in 0039… So I've technically missed…"

"26 years" Sonic finished the calculation as he noticed Alicia start to pause. While he didn't understand specifically the feelings of the smaller blonde, he knew it had to be at least tough to swallow, "Quite a long time, huh?"

"Yeah… a lot of time to miss... and not just for me" Alicia thought back to her mother in understanding, "Mother must've had it tough too. All that time, and even to this day, not knowing if I was still alive or not.

"Still, this doesn't mean I condone her actions with Fate" The smaller blonde levelled a serious gaze at the aforementioned taller blonde, unnerving her a little with the look, "I still am going to have a word with her when we meet again"

"At any rate" Sonic interjected, bringing the focus back to the task at hand, "I think we're getting close to the next transporter."

Sure enough, the robot-generating machine was on a crevice of one of the caverns. A quick swipe from Arf's claws did the trick of ensuring Eggman's hold over Quartz Quadrant was no more. Once again, the group made quick work of taking out the Metal Sonic projector as well before progressing on to the Future of the zone.

**[Quartz Quadrant –Future]  
>[BGM: "Quartz Quadrant (Good Future) Sonic CD (JPNEU)]**

The group landed in an underground utopia of a golden color scheme. The mining in this zone had ceased by this point and the darkness of the caverns was illuminated by the gleam of opulent towers. It was an absolute wonderland of quartz with futuristic domes that opened to a vast view of the mountains and forestry.

"Whoa!" Sonic pointed out the abundance of quartz crystals, "Check out all of the sparkles"

"This time zone has more quartz in it than any of the others" Alicia said with a grin, "Beautiful, ne?"

"Wow…." Nanoha found herself mesmerized by the gleaming of the quartz crystals.

"I feel a little bit jealous, Alicia-san" Fate admitted a little honestly, "You get to see these sights every day."

"Eh… it gets stale after a while" The smaller blonde shrugged, but she sent a smile at her companions, "However, now they have that nice feeling again because I'm sharing this awesome sight with new friends"

The trek was mostly straightforward, aided by the conveyor belts which were set to the general direction of the mage's travel. The forward progress had come to a quick halt, however, as a familiar foe was waiting for them.

* * *

><p><strong>[VS: Quartz Quadrant Boss]<br>[BGM: "Eggman battle" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

Doctor Eggman had waited for the heroes in a specific area. He waited for them from the safety of an indestructible booth with a purple color scheme. With a maniacal green, the scientist pressed a button and caused the forward-moving conveyor belt to stop, which also halted the forward progress of the heroes, much to their annoyance.

"Well, look what the cat dragged in" The doctor greeted the group with a sinister grin, "Like my little setup here?"

"Uh... what's the point of it?" The blue hedgehog asked in annoyance.

"Well first…" The doctor pressed a button on his console and made a wall of sharp spikes drop down behind the heroes. Another set of buttons pressed started the conveyor belt to rapidly drag the ground-based Sonic and Arf toward the spikes.

"No backtracking now. You're all mine" The doctor cackled madly as his lowered his console onto the ground, "How do you like that?"

"I'm so scared…" One could almost feel the sarcasm laced in Sonic's tone as the hedgehog was easily able to keep pace, he was sorely tempted to take flight, but he figured to give the scientist a bone, "You are aware of our flight, right?"

"Oh, I almost forgot" The doctor pressed another set of buttons which activated a set of fans from behind the wall. The fans began to rapidly pull air and threatened the airborne Nanoha, Fate and Alicia.

"I've done my homework this time around" The doctor grinned in self-satisfaction. The doctor went from satisfied to annoyance when he took notice of the airborne mages able to easily keep stride as well as their calmness in doing so, "Oh come on! Where's the fear?"

"Faced tougher" Fate shrugged and sent a knowing glance at her former rival's direction.

"Oh yeah!" The doctor shouted through gritted teeth as he pressed another set of buttons. This time he activated a mechanism that sent a crane out. The crane held what appeared to be a mine in its grasp, "Try this!"

The crane dropped the mine straight down onto the heroes. The mine was tricky for the aerial mages to avoid as they had to also battle the current while Sonic and Arf had to avoid the mine when it hit the ground. Fortunately, when they got passed it, it was only a matter of dealing with the conveyor belt and fan system.

"Still faced tougher" this time it was Nanoha who commented, though her innocence was still conveyed. She was not without her manners though, as she sent an apologetic bow in Eggman's direction, "Sorry, but you'll have to do better"

"You dare mock me!" Eggman took the rather innocent comment the wrong way. He was outright furious and it showed in his rapid operating of his computer, "I'll show you! I'll just crank this machine up to full power"

"_**Overload error!"**_ came the ambiguously robotic noise from the console of the doctor's machine, _**"This machine will self-destruct in five seconds!"**_

Eggman, rightfully furious, gave his console one last slam before he turned tail and bolted on foot. The machine exploded just as the doctor made his exit. Everyone had to halt completely as the fans and conveyor belts stopped. Good move on their part too, because had they not stopped, at least one person would've had the embarrassment of tripping in the sudden shift of balance.

* * *

><p><strong>[Boss Neutralized]<br>[Jingle: "Round Clear" Sonic CD (USA]**

While Sonic and Nanoha performed their usual victory dance, they must've inspired at least Alicia, because the shorter blonde decided to try her hand at it. As for Arf and Fate, they were still rather shy about it. When Sonic and Nanoha finished their little coordinated dance, they watched their new friend try her hand with curious eyes.

Alicia's own little pose of sorts involved the use of her paper fan. She twirled the fan skillfully in her left hand and made a few diagonal cross slashes at the air before hoisting the fan over her left shoulder and had her back turned to the others in a cool pose. The pose was cool, but Alicia's natural short size, clothing choice and overall cuteness gave off a cute rather than cool aura.

"Alright!" The short blonde said with a grin when she finished her pose, "What do you guys think?"

"Not bad for your first try" The hedgehog gave her a thumbs-up gesture, "If you want any pointers for the next one, come to me"

"Oh!" Fate's start drew a few glances. The taller blonde had found an orange-red Time Stone from the wreckage of Eggman's machine, "We've got another one now"

"3 more to go" Alicia noted as she approached her taller but technically younger sister and patted her on the back, "Nice work"

"Thank you." Fate's cheeks went an adorable shade of pink once more.

"So what's the next zone?" Arf asked, not that she minded the attention her mistress was getting; she'd just rather it not be at the expense of precious time.

"This way" Alicia said as she took point to guide the group to the next zone.

**[Eyecatch #1: The Sonic Team logo and Nanoha logo combine on one side with the respective katakana, hiragana and kanji read out "Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar" over a blank background that was replaced by a cute little hilltop scene with Sonic and Nanoha leaning against one another]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Eyecatch #2: Alicia is seen dragging Fate into a closet; appearing seconds later in a cute little cheerleader costume, and an embarrassed Fate, decked out in a matching uniform, behind her. A chibi version of Arf is seen hanging out next to the story logo nursing a nosebleed]<strong>

**[Little Planet: Wacky Workbench]  
>[BGM: "Wacky Workbench" Sonic CD (JPNEU)]**

The Wacky Workbench was a weapons warehouse within a canyon under the rule of electricity. There were many diverse machinations present, ranging from hovering platforms to checkered floor that would flicker occasionally. The color scheme for the present zone included dark blue, cyan blue and purple.

"So this is where you built your device?" Nanoha curiously asked Alicia.

"Yeah, this place looked like it was designed to be a warehouse, and I used the electricity to construct my device" the shorter blonde replied, "I don't think I'll be able to do any of this again, because I only just made this device after several failed prototypes"

"You named your device 'Lucky Star'" Fate let her curiosity influence her line of questioning, "Was that intentional?"

"Yup, I'd honestly say Little Planet was what saved my life after that accident" Alicia answered honestly with a content smile on her face to show her gratitude, "It's been my little "Lucky Star", so I figure I'll name this device after it. That way I'll always remember what this world has done for me"

"Um… Anything major to watch out for here?" Nanoha asked as she gave a calculative look around the zone to identify some of the possible obstacles

"Watch your step when you're walking on the floor with the checkerboard pattern" The resident "guide" said and gestured to the aforementioned floor, "Especially when they flicker, because then they'll – "

"KYAAAAAAAA!" Arf's surprised squeal caught all attention and drew the humorous glances of everyone else. The large wolf familiar had suffered the embarrassment of taking a step onto the aforementioned floor as it flickered. The poor wolf was sent sky high up onto a higher platform.

"Send… you…flying…" Alicia could barely finish that sentence with so much of a straight face as it took her a lot of willpower to keep from laughing.

"Oooh" Sonic followed the trail of orange in awe and amusement, "She caught airtime"

"Uh Arf?" Fate called to her familiar as she, with everyone else in tow, flew up to the platform in which the wolf landed. The taller blonde couldn't help but giggle in amusement when she saw the wolf curled up quite cutely in some fear and shock, "Are you alright?"

"Fine… Just fine…" The wolf levelled a half-serious, half-embarrassed glare in the direction of her comrades. Why their amusement had to come at her own expense she had no idea, "Yes, laugh it up now"

"I was explaining how the floor works and if you stopped to listen this could've been avoided" Alicia noted, her tone was laced with amusement.

It took a moment, but the group of heroes, including a humbled and embarrassed Arf, progressed through the zone. Along with the bomb dropping robots and streetlight designed robots, they also had to contend with the air vents which threatened to freeze anyone that stepped under it. Luckily, Alicia had the ability to time the bursts and guide her comrades past the vents as they moved on.

The biggest issue with regards to the time travelling was the built of speed. With the bouncy floor and the freezing air traps, it was hard to build up speed through the "Past" sign. Fortunately, though, the pipe transfer systems made up for that and they were able to make the jump as the effects were starting to expire.

* * *

><p><strong>[Wacky Workbench –Past]<br>[BGM: "Wacky Workbench (Past)" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

In the past zone, the workbench was still under construction with the various platforms and support girders taking on a bright greenish hue. With the cranes for construction purposes located underneath them, the red colored canyons served as the peaceful backdrop. Despite a majority of the workbench still being under construction, the bouncy floors, freezing air traps and other various devices were still active.

"I'm going to ask a really stupid question here" Sonic, while he was in awe of the beautiful landscape, he was bugged by the fact that despite all of the technological advancements he's seen in Little Planet, the world was devoid of any other sentient life aside from Alicia, "Who's working all of this construction stuff?"

"It's all automated" Alicia replied simply, "From what I can tell, the power source of the planet's natural machines comes from the quartz we found in the previous zone's mine"

"Alright, let's see where that machine of Eggy's is this time" Sonic declared as he was about to take a tentative step forward. He would've done so, had he not been held back by Alicia.

"Wait" the smaller blonde urged, and gestured to the strip of electrical current in the background. The danger of the current wasn't probably needed to be said, but she did so anyways, "Watch out for these currents. They are highly electric and WILL shock the hell out of anyone who tries to cross"

Sure enough, the current started and the power of the workbench, even under construction was on full display as a few grasshopper-shaped robots and wasp-themed robots just happened to cross the current. They were electrocuted with no delay. It was quite the odd, but unnerving gaze. None of the mages or familiars wanted any part of that current generator.

The robot generator machine in this zone was a lot tougher to locate and it wasn't just because of the electrical currents or the bouncy floors. The group had to traverse through the tricky, but effective transit system in order to get to the specific machine. Eggman must've anticipated interlopers because he had made sure that this particular machine would be hard to find.

After the generator was swiftly destroyed by a sword swipe from Sonic's kodachi, the group went on to search for the Metal Sonic projector. Unlike the other machine of Eggman's, he had placed the projector in a far more visible and accessible place. It was done for the reason that the resident animals would easily come across it and feel the fear that the projector was supposed to carry.

Just before the group had decided to press on to the future, Alicia had one last attraction to showcase in the past. It took her a while to get to it due to the tricky placement and location, but the smaller blonde was able to locate a secret room in the workbench's past that had the statue of a beautiful angel.

"Pretty…" Nanoha admired the work of art in awe

"I found this here just recently. I think it's supposed to be some sort of a temple" Alicia noted, and gestured to the stone pillars that seemed to act as support, "I don't know its true purpose, but that statue has given me some ideas that I'd like to try out when I get the right materials."

"Idea?" Sonic glanced at the small blonde with interest, "Do tell"

"Ah, ah, ah!" The girl wagged her finger rather teasingly and cutely in front of the hedgehog's face, "A girl can't go revealing all of her secrets at once, ne?"

"She's got you there" Nanoha giggled softly in amusement.

Much like his pouting counterpart, Sonic had opted to pout in embarrassment for the rest of the current time zone. As humorously cute and entertaining it was to see similar looks on the faces of the familiars, there still was a job to do. With Bardiche, Raising Heart and Lucky Star to document the cuteness of Sonic and Arf's actions though, the scene would not go unforgotten as the group pressed on to the future.

* * *

><p><strong>[Wacky Workbench –Future]<br>[BGM: "Wacky Workbench (Good Future)" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

There was a serene peaceful feeling throughout the future of the zone. The workbench, which was originally blue and purple in design, had become an advanced, futuristic workbench with a pink and purple color scheme. All of the dangerous machinery and security systems were replaced with safer and more efficient technology. Evidently the design of the workbench had been suited for childish tastes as it was designed to appear more to be a toy land versus a weapons storage warehouse.

"Trippy color scheme" The blue hedgehog commented offhandedly, "But at least it's peaceful."

"Is this where we'll find your little lair?" Arf asked as she glanced at the shorter blonde with a neutral expression on her face, though it was hard to tell as she was in her wolf form.

"Yeah, but like I said it's not much." Alicia shrugged, "I only used it when I was performing experiments like making my device. Aside from that, I've been living just about anywhere, so I don't see much of a reason to show you guys"

"Fair enough" Nanoha interjected, "We're kinda working against the clock enough as it is, and the last thing we need are distractions."

With that said, the group trekked on through the peaceful toyland of a workbench zone. The bouncy floors gave quite the humorous show with the constant flickering and Arf finding herself on the embarrassing end of a fair number of unwilling bounces. Like the good futures of previous zones, the workbench zone was devoid of any robots, replaced by the cute critters that called Little Planet their home.

As the occurrence of a certain mad scientist had become something of a running theme, there was little doubt that he would show up again in this zone. The good doctor had once again made a habit of waiting for the group to progress through a certain point before blocking the way behind them.

"Well hello again my annoying little interlopers" The doctor had once again put up a sophisticated and sinister aura as he descended upon the group of five. His latest creation wasn't too much really, just a rocket he piloted himself that was armored up to the teeth with a drill head installed on top of the machine.

The old man had once again done his homework because not only was the path behind the heroes blocked by a wall, effectively trapping them. There was also what appeared to be a conductive spike on the opposite walls; they appeared close to the ground, giving an indication that if activated, they would most likely electrocute the floor.

"I have to hand it to you this time doc" The blue hedgehog grinned a little playfully, "You actually built something that "looks" dangerous."

* * *

><p><strong>[VS: Wacky Workbench Boss]<br>[BGM: "Eggman Battle" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

"Oh~ho-ho! Believe me my spiny blue annoyance, this machine doesn't just "look" dangerous, it IS dangerous" The doctor cackled madly as he activated the rear thrusters on the rocket, "Let me show you!"

With a simple flick of the wrist and a series of buttons pressed, Eggman launched straight up and dug a medium-sized hole straight in the center of the ceiling. On the surface, that didn't look as threatening, but, the sudden drilling caused large pieces of debris to fall at such a rapid pace. Were it not for the good reflexes, the mages and familiars would've surely been hurt.

To make matters all the more complicated, the electrical current started to warm up on their current floor and the bouncy floor was about to be activated. There weren't too many options available as the presence of the debris made it tough for the flyers to navigate through. Luckily, the group took notice of the fact that there were some of the heavier pieces of debris that could support the weight of an average person.

With the succession of the tactic, the group progressed to the next floor and took advantage of Eggman's pause to deal some damage in the form of a combined Photon Lancer courtesy of the Testarossa siblings. The rocket was armored enough to absorb most of the damage, but not without the cost of a few solid dents.

"Grr… So you figured out my little trap huh." The doctor gritted his teeth, "Well don't consider yourselves too lucky this time, with the hole in the floor here, you'll have less room to avoid all of the debris!"

Once again Eggman took his rocket drill contraption up into the next floor. His words rang true as the mages had the tough time of avoiding the debris as there was less room to move about in. To make matters more interesting, several rock spikes started to fall from the area in which Eggman drilled. It took all of the mages and familiar reflexes to avoid the spikes and heavy debris.

Once again, the bouncy floor, despite the huge hole in it, was about to be activated and electrified again. The time frame was merely seconds, but it was enough for the group of heroes to find a solid ground to work off of. They once again proceeded to the next floor; Sonic and Nanoha combined for a volley of the Divine Shooter to deal the damage this time.

"Gah! You little!" The doctor screamed in frustration as he saw the dents from the previous attack turn into complete tears in his precious rocket's armor, "I will make you pay!"

Another series of buttons were pressed and the rocket was sent into overdrive. Unfortunately this time, when the doctor launched upwards, he was stuck in the ceiling of the workbench. That only meant that there was no escape for the scientist though, as the mages still had to work around the sharp spikes and cluster of debris falling right for them.

Arf didn't even wait for the floor to start up before she took flight and clawed her way through the rest of the rocket's armor from one tear to the next. She must've ripped a few power cords or something because the rocket began to rapidly not only lose power, but the ensuring fight with gravity to keep it afloat.

"Nooooo!" The doctor cried out as his previous rocket exploded on contact. The force of the impact sent Eggman flying out of the zone.

* * *

><p><strong>[Boss Neutralized]<br>[Jingle: "Round Clear' Sonic CD (USA)]**

The post-victory battle cheer was celebrated with Sonic and Nanoha's usual dance. Alicia had followed suit, only this time she twirled her handguns between her fingertips before she stowed them away much like a cowboy (or cowgirl) in the old western shows. The biggest surprise though, was that Fate and Arf had felt a little bit of inspiration to try it out, they probably would've admitted that it was just so they wouldn't feel left out afterwards, but it was a start.

The taller blonde was shy about it at first, but she eventually settled with a skillful twirl of Bardiche before placing the device in a resting position at her hip. Arf had let out a loud, but not deafeningly so, howl before she scratched at her fur a little bit with her rear paws.

"Not bad for a start you two" Sonic complimented, "I think next time, or at least by the time this is over, I'll have a fully coordinated dance for us all."

"D-don't get too many ideas, blue boy" The wolf familiar said with a tsun-ish ton to her voice, "I was only doing this because Fate wanted to give it a try."

"Whatever floats your boat" the blue hedgehog shrugged a little bit in a dismissing fashion, for him, the thought mattered more than much else.

"Guys, look!" Nanoha interjected as she opted to do something productive in searching through the wreckage of Eggman's latest failure. Her efforts were rewarded greatly as she held out a dark blue Time Stone, "Pretty..."

"That's five for us now" Alicia grinned in satisfaction as they were once step closer to kicking Baldy McNosehair off of Little Planet for good, "We're getting closer now!"

"Eggman realizes that too" Sonic noted with a frown, "This one wasn't exactly a cakewalk."

"We should be careful from here on" Fate cautioned as had soon realized just what the blue hedgehog had meant, "I think he's starting to get desperate, which means we could be facing anything now from here on."

"With the five of us teamed up, there's no way we'll lose" There was a certain air of confidence in Alicia's tone as she said that, "Whatever happens, if we all have each other's backs and trust, things will go along just fine."

"Heh…" Sonic kept a confident grin to match, "I'd like to see what Eggman throws at us next time!"

Little did Sonic or the others know that despite their victories, they still have to contend with Eggman's second-in-command; Metal Sonic, who would be waiting in the wings. Can the heroes keep their confident spirits up, or will the battle against the metallic menace prove to be their last?

**[To Be Continued]**

**[End of Main Chapter]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Omake: Size Matters Not]<strong>

Sure, by all technicalities given, Alicia was technically the oldest between her and Fate. Thus by all contexts, she would be considered the older sister. Though if anyone weren't told otherwise, they might've assumed it was the other way around first.

"I've done my math here guys, and technically I am the oldest girl among us right now" The smaller of the blondes admitted with some pride, "I doubt I'll ever act the my technical age though, it wouldn't be fun right now"

"I don't know if everyone's going to think of you being the older sister though," Nanoha noted innocently enough.

"Oh?" Alicia was intrigued, "And why is that?"

"Well…." The innocent and cute Nanoha found herself quickly struggling for a way to put the word gently. Quickly enough, the brunette had to bite the bullet, "You're shorter than the rest of us here"

"Short?!" for one reason or another, the smaller of the Testarossa siblings had also the more volatile of tempers and unfortunately for Nanoha, she found herself quickly on the wrong end of such a temper, "WHO ARE YOU CALLING SHORTER THAN A MINISKIRT?"

'_I didn't even say that'_ Nanoha deadpanned in thought.

The pain of the shorter older sibling… never remind them of that fact, least you want to come out of it alive.

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 19]<strong>

Author's Notes:

(1): This is going by a speculation with the calendar on the Nanoha wikia. Some evidence has linked a conversion of the Mid-Childan calendar and the year in which the Jewel Seed Incident occurs would've been in 2006, which makes sense due to the original series launching in 2005

(2): This is following the Mid-Childan New Calendar. Why they have chosen this format is beyond me.

Little bit of trivia, quartz crystals are used in watches and timing devices. I found this out while I was typing this chapter. Pretty cool eh?

As usual, read and review... constructive reviews are always a positive as I'd like to see how I'm improving


	20. Chapter 20

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in the penultimate chapter to the Little Planet arc. Good action coming up now, let's gets right to it. Disclaimer: I do not own Sonic, Nanoha or their respective franchises; that'll keep the legal team of vampires and robot-maids happy.

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: Metallic Madness]<br>[BGM: "Metallic Madness (Present)" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

Prior to his descent into supposed madness and his obsession with world conquest, Doctor Eggman had the reputation of being a world-renowned and composed scientist. However, if anyone were to have the chance to look beyond that image, they would find a man with some serious anger management issues. Some would say that the doctor was dedicated to his craft and would often be short-tempered, but others would've just said he was an arrogant brat.

Despite the anger issues, there was one thing that could not be doubted; Doctor Eggman's intelligence. The man's IQ had been recently calculated to over 300 points and he had an understanding of machines and robotics the likes of which no one could've thought possible. Not only that, he had the knowledge to use his intelligence; granted his temper didn't get the better of him.

"Curses!" The aforementioned temper had recently blown the top once again. The doctor was absolutely fuming after his recent defeat in Wacky Workbench, "Curse that blue hedgehog and his fawning girlfriends!

"Not only have they destroyed over half of the robotic forces I've mustered up for this world" The doctor slammed his desk in fury once more in his rant, "But they keep stealing the Time Stones that I wanted. I've only got two left and they aren't enough for what I have planned!"

"You know, Doctor, all of this "Yelling to yourself" nonsense isn't going to help you." a young, female voice chided in a rather boring tone. The doctor's other "guest/prisoner" was the pink hedgehog captured from Collision Chaos, Amy Rose.

The girl was tied up to a post nearby, but she didn't seem that much scared; rather annoyed. She may have been scared at first when that metallic copy of her idol had dumped her in Eggman's clutches, but she grew bored of it rather quickly. In her defense, who wouldn't get bored if you had to spend the better part of an hour listening to some grown man act like a whiny little crybaby when he didn't get his way?

"In fact, it's not only given me a headache" The pink hedgehog went on further, "But it's also a painful reminder of how bad your breath stinks"

Ever since the pink hedgehog arrived she was one headache after another for the furious scientist. Not only was she without a Time Stone, which drew the wrath of Eggman on Metal Sonic for mistakenly capturing her, but she was a pain in the egg with her constant complaining. The doctor had almost half a mind to drop her off with the heroes and let them deal with her, but figured she would've been good bait.

"Shut up, Pink girl!" Eggman turned his rage to the hedgehog that dared to insult him, "You're lucky I still have use for you otherwise I would've been ever-so-happy to make you into one of my special robots."

"Ewww!" Amy gagged in response, no doubt taking the wrong context from the statement; it didn't help that she was imprisoned by a middle-aged and apparently single man, "Gross! Icky! Dirty old man! Have the police talked to you about your pedophilia?"

"Y-you think I'm some perverted freak!?" If Eggman's face were to turn any redder in fury, he would've rivalled a fire extinguisher, "Why you little…"

Alarms from the console in front of the doctor conveniently distracted Eggman from unleashing his fury on the pink hedgehog. The alarms indicated that he had intruders in the Stardust Speedway zone. The doctor would've blown his top in rage had a cunning plot hadn't hatched in that egghead of his.

"Oh yes…." The doctor smirked evilly, giving one more glance at the pink hedgehog, "This is just perfect."

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 20<br>Race of the Hedgehogs**

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: Stardust Speedway]<br>[Local Time: 0940 hours]  
>[BGM: "Stardust Speedway (Present)" Sonic CD (JPNEU)]**

Alicia led her allies to the highway zone, Stardust Speedway. The zone was a highway themed with musical instruments over a large city. As the namesake of the zone implied, the city glowed with many lights much akin to the glow of stardust.

"Whoa!" Sonic was close to gaping in awe at the city below the speedway, "Now that is one huge city!"

"Are you sure it's not inhabited?" Nanoha asked rather curiously, finding it rather improbable that such a large city could be devoid of inhabitants.

"Sadly, yes" Alicia nodded solemnly, as much as she'd wish otherwise, "I wouldn't have felt so lonely if it was."

"Well… um… you're not alone now" Fate, feeling her confidence in speaking with her original rise during the time spent together, tried to assure the shorter blonde, "You have us now."

"Yeah, we're here!" Arf, having caught on to what her mistress was attempting, provided support in her efforts, "Is there anything hold you back here?"

"Nothing, I have been thinking about leaving when I was confident in my flying" Alicia caught onto the idea, and had an honest ambition of trying to leaving the planet, "When the Planet appeared over your world this time, I felt that this was the time, but some fatso had to ruin it."

"We'll kick him out in no time." Sonic assured her of that, "And maybe after we do, you could come with us when we leave."

"Tempting, and I was going to see if it was possible to meet with Mother as well." Alicia sounded intrigued by the offer already, but there was one thing she had to make sure of, "Would I get to spend more time with my adorable little sister?"

"We're not in a position to make any promises" Nanoha answered, letting Alicia know of the uncertainty, though she wasn't without optimism, "But I think it's possible"

Fate took the conversation as an opportunity to attain a clear look of the zone they were about to proceed through. The first thing she noticed was the fact that the overall design seemed to be focused on speed, either land or air. The roads were thin, long with a far more curves than straightaways. She found herself a little bit puzzled by the loop-de-loops and the weird contraptions on the ground right before them.

"Um, Alicia-san?" The taller blonde questioned in some concern and curiosity; "Why does this area have a different design than the others?"

"It's designed to test our speed" the shorter blonde replied, almost pouting a little when her "clone" used a formal context of reference, "Those things on the ground are speed-boosters. If you pass through them, they'll instantly push you in the same direction."

Sonic couldn't quite hide the grin on his face when one of his favorite words was said. If there was one thing that becoming a familiar didn't change, it was his love for speed and going fast. The hedgehog felt reminded of the Star Light Zone from South Island; albeit there was less robotic interference. On the note of the robots, he had to restrain a groan at the lack of originality displayed by his arch-nemesis of a scientist as the aforementioned mechanical foes held the same bug-theme. They did appear to be something of a challenge as there were aerial fly-themed units that were swift and the electrically charged light-bugs. Not to mention the armored centipede bug robots that had Sonic wishing he had a lawyer to sue Eggman for copyright infringement on his spin-dash.

The group proceeded through the zone at a far quicker pace than the previous zones. As the Speedway was named appropriately, there was little room for error in control. The robots, despite being unoriginally themed, proved to be a fair challenge as the light-bug themed robots had shot out streams of electricity between them, which threatened the safety of the mages. Thankfully they were still fodder to Fate and Arf's Photon Lancers. The fly robots were dispatched easily as well with Alicia's sharpshooting skill while the armored centipedes were put into their place as scrap metal from Sonic's original spin dash.

Were it not for Nanoha's keen eye in her flight, the group might've missed a Past sign in their progression. Thankfully, the white-clad mage had easily got them to adjust their route and blaze right on through the sign. The nauseating feeling returned as the mages and familiars were instantly transported through time. One might have thought that they would've been used to it at some point, but the Speedway's emphasis on speed had complicated matters.

* * *

><p><strong>[Stardust Speedway –Past]<br>[BGM: "Stardust Speedway (Past)" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

Upon setting foot into the past of the Speedway and battling with the motion sickness of the high-speed time travel; Sonic and Nanoha felt a historically familiar vibe from the zone. Historical in the sense that the zone had taken an ancient theme that resembled the old times of the Romans and the Greeks, albeit with the greenish themed overgrow of vines.

"Et Tu, Brute?" Sonic, nevertheless, made no attempt to withhold his quick delivery of a themed quip.

"Clever, Sonic-kun" Nanoha would give her familiar the historical reference behind it, but held a reservation over how it fit with the zone's theme, "The colors are off though"

"But the theme isn't" Countered the blue hedgehog with a grin.

The little banter would've been cute and funny had Alicia, Arf and Fate could understand the historical context behind it. As the trio was local to Mid-Childa at some point, there was little understanding and some confusion to them.

"If you two are done?" Arf interjected the bantering duo from Earth. Not that she wanted to ruin their fun, she could hardly care less; she'd rather have the mission completed ASAP.

Despite the small moment of embarrassment, Nanoha and Sonic were quick to recover and press onward with the rest of the team. The robots they faced were little different than the ones in the present; if only a bit faster as the robots hadn't "aged" per se in the passing of time from Little Planet. In the end, they were still scrap metal to the combined group of mages and familiars.

Following the pattern from the previous zones, the mages had successfully located and destroyed not only the robot-generating machine, but also the Metal Sonic projector. The action not only ensured that Eggman's physical hold over the zone was over, but as was his emotional hold over the animals that weren't in hiding. Before they could take a little trip to confront the doc in the future zone, they had to make one little stop in the present to take care of something that Sonic thought he noticed prior to the time jump.

**[Eyecatch #1: A chibi version of Sonic was chased by a chibi version of Amy Rose back and forth through a light-blue background. The chibi pink hedgehog was stopped in her tracks rather comically by a well-timed barrier spell conjured by a chibi Nanoha. Chibis Fate, Arf and Alicia had watched the humorous scene close to the logo]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Eyecatch #2: Chibi versions of Fate and Nanoha enjoyed an absolutely adorable picnic scene by the countryside. Each girl enjoyed the latter's baked cookies and bread. The two would hug afterward and the whole scene appeared in a dream bubble as a sleeping Nanoha and Fate had shared the cute dream and their physical bodies were drooling a bit, much to the annoyance of Sonic, whom Nanoha had clung tight to in her dream while Arf delighted in Fate's adorable hug. The story logo would appear on the side with a chibi Alicia cutely pouting on the star part of the logo]<strong>

**[Stardust Speedway –Present]  
>[BGM: "Stardust Speedway" Sonic CD (JPNEU)]**

"So what are we doing here?" Arf asked the minute the group had landed in the present; she was obviously getting used to the whole "time jump" thing, not that she liked that feeling though, "If we're following your video game script thing, we should've been at the boss level or something already"

"I thought I saw some construction work around here before we jumped" the blue hedgehog answered with a bit of a frown as he took a long look into the environment of the speedway, looking for something in particular. He must've found what he was looking for, because the sight he took in had deepened his frown, "There it is…"

Following the hedgehog's gaze, the others had to take great lengths to keep their faces from looking too disgusted. There was a construction site near the center of the zone. The site was for a large statue in Eggman's appearance. None of the robots present looked threatening in any manner, just a few in hard hats with one resembling a contractor.

"Yeah… Eggman's got some serious issues" the blue hedgehog noted in annoyance. He had contemplated closing his eyes, but the image spot of such a sight was already burned in his mind.

"He's probably having the robots build the statue in this time so that way it'll be complete in the future" Alicia noted the logic, despite how dumb the idea really was, behind the construction, "Which means if we take it out here, we won't have to see it in the Future"

"Just what I was thinking to" Sonic agreed with a grin, "Who's up for some renovations?"

"_**Cannon Mode!"**_ Raising Heart's rapid response had her master and everyone else briefly wondering if the Intelligent Device was alive.

After shifting into the aforementioned combined bombardment and sealing form, Raising Heart had displayed more of its prowess by already charging up the energy needed for a low power Divine Buster. No one took exception to Nanoha taking out the construction site and whatever progress the robots had made to the statue, though there as the lingering regret that they couldn't have joined in on the fun.

With the eyesore of a statue out of the way, the group was ever the more eager to progress onto the Future and take on Eggman, and with the speed-oriented layout of the Speedway zone, there was little delay in finding and utilizing a Future sign.

* * *

><p><strong>[Stardust Speedway –Future]<br>[BGM: "Stardust Speedway (Good Future)" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

The Good Future of the Speedway zone had kept the more modern look from the present, albeit it resembled more of an amusement park or a carnival rather than a city. As the time of day was still rather in the middle of the morning, the illumination from the sun had lightened the purplish hues of the road on which they travelled.

"I'm seeing colors I didn't even know existed" Sonic noted in comment.

"Yeah, they're so pretty too." Nanoha added as she took in the scenery. She was acutely aware that they had made the time jump near the location of where the Eggman statue was being built, but she could hardly expect the sight that it was replaced by, "Whoa!"

The others had followed her gaze and, apart from Alicia, whom might have seen it before, they let out a collective gasp. The statue of Dr. Eggman was replaced by what appeared to be a beautiful cathedral-like mansion. Upon the inquiring of her lack of response by the others, Alicia merely shrugged and said that the cathedral was already present when she had arrived. She didn't use it much as she wasn't too religious.

Admittedly, the team was curious to see how Eggman would react when he found that his precious statue was not to be completed and that may have inspired them to keep a quicker pace through the zone. Although, the faster pace could've also been due to the speed boosters as well, but it didn't matter as they still made their progression swift.

It wasn't long before they caught sight of the familiar Egg-Mobile. They would've been disappointed as the mech was only modified to hold a laser canon, but the disappointment turned to slight curiosity and confusion as they had found the doctor hovering over what would appear to be the starting line of a race course.

**[BGM: "Eggman Battle" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

"Well hello there" The doctor almost casually greeted the group. Red flags were already raised from the doctor's tone in of itself, not to mention the fact that he hadn't erupted into any childish fits when his statue construction was abruptly put to a halt, "You're just in time"

"I'll bite" Sonic, taking the role of the de facto leader for the encounter, decided to humor Eggman and hear out the old fool, "What are we in time for?"

"Why, the race of the century!" The doctor declared proudly and it was only then that the group that his regular red suit was replaced by a flagman's outfit for a stock-car race. Sonic had to hold back a quip about the fashion police as his attention was drawn to a figure on the starting line.

Greenish eyes met flickering red ones as Sonic stared down his metallic counterpart, Metal Sonic. The robot had carried itself in a rather cocky fashion as it impatiently tapped its metallic foot on the ground. It was obvious that the robot was going to compete in the race, but the real question would be who his opponent would be.

"I see you've already met Hyper Metal Sonic" The doctor idly said, giving a name to the robot that was also responsible for the kidnapping of Amy Rose, "He's my second-in-command here on Little Planet, you know"

"And you name him after me?" Sonic mocked with a grin, "Awe, I'm touched"

"I wonder if you'll be saying that after he beats you" Eggman refused to take the bait on that one, merely countered with a challenge, "After all, you're going to be the one he races"

"And what makes you think that I'll be interested in racing?" the blue hedgehog countered, with honesty as he didn't really feel like humoring that part of Eggman's plot.

"Because I have one of your friends here held hostage at the end of this course" The doctor was quick to provide proof in the form of a video screen that displayed the captured Amy Rose tied up against a post at the finish line, "You win the race, you can have her back."

"Okay, genius scientist, did it occur to you that we have magic?" Sonic countered once again, finding some amusement in the exchange as he was aware of his status superiority in the situation, "What's to stop us from binding your mech in chains, rushing through the course and saving the damsel in distress?"

"Ah… well... b-because… well… I uh… installed a safety net" The doctor absolutely fumbled in his answer and the best he could do was bluff, "Yeah, a safety net. If you try that then I'll shock her with the electric bindings I tied her up in."

The bluff was rushed and half-assed and even Eggman knew that the team wasn't buying it. The doctor silently cursed his lack of preparation on that front and knew that his plot was crumbling fast. To his shock, he noticed that the group had started to turn towards the course and enact their plan when they were abruptly stopped by an unknown force.

"_Stop!"_ Lindy ordered the team of mages and familiars over the communication channel. As it was privy only to the mages and familiars, there was no way that the doctor could eavesdrop.

"_What is it, Lindy-san?" _Nanoha inquired curiously, she had a feeling that the admiral caught onto the bluff, but was unsure as to why she stopped them from calling the doctor out on it.

"_I'm sure you are aware that he's bluffing, but I want you to play along anyways"_ The woman calmly stated; if need be, she would've made it an order. Her reasoning was also understandable enough, _"I want to give this madman a sample of what happens when he trifles with us."_

It took all of about 30 seconds to determine the course of action from there. Lindy hadn't officially ordered the group to buy into the poor bluff, but the respect they had for her made it unnecessary. The doctor's surprise could only grow as Sonic approached the starting line, where he then performed a series of stretches to loosen up.

"Uh…" Eggman, whom normally wasn't an idiot, certainly felt like one at the moment, his question didn't help matters, "Are you going to race?"

"No" Sonic replied sarcastically, "I'm just admiring the track, here's your sign"

'_Walked right into that one'_ Eggman smacked his forehead in annoyance, especially after the girls gave the hedgehog a little courtesy giggle for the joke.

The doctor was quick to recover from his slight moment of embarrassment in record time as he pressed a few buttons on the console of his egg-mobile. The laser cannon mounted on his Egg-Mobile would fire off a few test beams down onto the ground just to make sure they were working.

"This will make it even more interesting" the doctor grinned, "If you fall too far behind, this laser will blast you to the next world."

"I'm so scared" Sonic mocked, definitely not scared at all. He had already finished his pre-race stretches and was pretty much waiting for the signal to go off to start the race.

"_We'll cover you from the air"_ Nanoha said as she and the other three took to a small hover, _"We won't interfere with the race, but we'll make sure Eggman doesn't try anything sneaky and cheat!"_

"_Got it!"_ Sonic replied with a grin, he would opt to take the race on the ground, for a few reasons really. For one, he could really rub it into the doctor's face, for two, his flight wasn't nearly as stable as the others just yet.

"Ready…." The doctor declared with an excited grin as his console would light up much like a raceway light set. There would be 3 yellow lights flashing up before the long green to start them off, "GO!"

* * *

><p><strong>[Race: Sonic vs Metal Sonic]<br>[BGM: "Stardust Speedway (Bad Future)" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

The green signal sent Sonic and Metal off in twin flashes of blue. Had Nanoha, Fate and Arf not already been used to the speed of the blue hedgehog familiar. The first challenge in the race, which pitted Sonic's foot speed against Metal's flight, included a tricky obstacle course that included twists and turns that tested both racers' control. The nod would've gone to Metal for his flight having an answer, but Sonic had shown early on that he could handle the turns on his high speed.

It was during a set of straightaways that Sonic had discovered a few dirty little secrets the good doctor had installed in his metallic counterpart. If Sonic had too much of a lead, which he normally would've tried to monopolize, the robot would attempt to overtake him under the protection of a burning fireball aura. The hedgehog had to sacrifice some of his speed to avoid the fireball with a short leap.

In doing so, Sonic had to up his pace to not only keep from being blasted by Eggman, but also catch up to Metal. That was when the robot had deployed its second countermeasure. Metal had sacrificed some of its own speed to deploy an electrical barrier in attempt to electrocute the hedgehog should he try to overtake him.

Fortunately, Sonic had his own advantages to use in the race. Sure, he said he wasn't going to take flight in the race, but there were more than one ways to take the advantage of the higher ground. Using the Floater Field spell that he had picked up from a certain Tutorial Ferret, Sonic was able to deploy a series of glyphs above the metallic fake's head and use them as platforms.

Despite the advantages that both racers were capable of utilizing, the race was a close one. Neither Sonic nor Metal could utilize their perks when the race hit another set of twists and turns decorated with dangerous spikes to make sure that mistakes were minimized. Sonic had maintained a close lead through this part of the course as well, despite the flight advantage that Metal had.

The race reached the proverbial home stretch as the finish line was clear in sight. The support mages and wolf familiar had flown over the final gate, but made no moves in dealing with the captive Amy Rose, who was completely surprised to see them. A dirty glare from the wolf familiar Arf had kept the pink hedgehog from making any sort of a scene as the focus was maintained on the race.

Sonic and Metal both kicked into high gear for the final stretch. Sonic had utilized his signature Super-Peel Out dash while Metal opted for the fireball charge. Despite Metal's hard effort, the 2+ second lead that Sonic had taken with his signature dash had sealed the deal straight and he was able to easily pass through the finish gate.

The downside to Metal's all-or-nothing charge was that there was no way the robot could stop itself from the harsh impact with the door. He flew right into it and outright shattered into pieces upon impact.

"Gah! Metal!" The doctor cried out in shock as he was helpless in watching his finest work break apart in its loss against the blue hedgehog. The doctor flew past the gate and stopped to confront the group one last time.

"You may have won this time, but I still have my base in the next zone" The doctor declared with a mad scowl as he had already started to leave, but not before leaving the group the purple Time Stone; he considered it a bonus, but was still confident that he would get it back and much more.

* * *

><p><strong>[1<strong>**st**** Place: Sonic]  
>[Jingle: "Round Clear" Sonic CD (JPNEU)]**

Normally, Sonic would've celebrated his victory with a small pose, but Nanoha had freed Amy Rose just as the doctor left. The blue hedgehog, uncomfortably so, had to endure a clingy glomp hug from the pink hedgehog. To add to his horror, none of the other girls had tried to help him in the matter as they felt that the damsel in distress deserves to hug her hero.

Luckily for Sonic, the ecstatic pink hedgehog had kept her hug somewhat tame. For some reason, the blue hedgehog couldn't help but notice his wolf counterpart Arf glaring daggers into the back of the pink hedgehog. He wasn't alone in noticing the wolf's behavior as Nanoha and Fate had also taken note. While Nanoha appeared oblivious and a little curious, Fate appeared to have a clue, but kept silent.

"Alright, pinkie, you've had your fun." Alicia, while amused by the antics of the group before her, still felt that a job was still present; and she had taken charge in getting the focus back on the task at hand, "We need our ally back, thank you very much."

"Mou… Fine" the pink hedgehog relented and released her blue crush from the glomp grip. She sent a pouting look in the shorter blonde's direction, only to relent in nerves as she took the full force of Arf's glare.

"Looks like we've got one last zone to go through" Sonic was the first to comment about Eggman's parting words, "And Eggman said he'd throw out all of the stops on it too."

"Do you know anything about the next zone, Alicia-chan?" Nanoha queried of the shorter blonde in curiosity, "Anything that we should be aware of?"

"Well I know that it's based on technology" Alicia admitted that much, but she was unsure as to whatever else she could offer, she usually was reluctant to go past the Speedway on her own, "I know there are a few traps and mazes, but I don't know any of the specifics. The place unnerves me no matter what Time zone I visit it in"

"Time zone?" Amy Rose asked in confusion; clearly she hadn't been aware of the time warping capabilities of Little Planet, "What do you mean?"

"Nothing for you to know" Arf replied coolly, though in hindsight, she'd probably question her treatment of the pink hedgehog. The wolf didn't quite know what to make of it, but for some reason, Amy Rose just kept annoying her, especially with how clingy she was of the blue hedgehog.

"Arf" Fate scolded lightly, while she was somewhat understanding of her familiar's annoyance regarding the pink hedgehog, she still had to mind her manners, "You don't have to be that hard on her"

"Sorry" The wolf genuinely apologized; if there was one thing she was trying to avoid, it was the ire of her mistress. The poor girl had been through enough trouble in the past month and the last thing she wanted to do was add onto that with her attitude, "I'm just wondering what we should do with her"

"You're not thinking of leaving me behind, are you?" the pink hedgehog did not appear to like that idea. Not only would she be separated from the boy of her childish affections, but she would also miss out on the chance to impress him as well.

"It is dangerous in the next zone" Nanoha noted rather innocently. She had to step back in a defensive manner when the pink hedgehog levelled a glare in her direction, "Not that I'm saying you can't handle yourself, it's just that Eggman's robots can hurt if you're not careful."

"I know that, I spent the last hour or so trapped in that base" Amy had to restrain her excitement a little when her counter drew up another idea which could be a productive gamble. Her hobby of Tarot Card reading had developed a keen sense of sight and recognition, "And I think I know the place too"

"Really?" Alicia couldn't help but lace her tone with ice in skepticism, "You were captured and dragged into that hellhole by Eggman's robots; how can you possibly know the area?"

"I've got a good memory" the pink hedgehog replied in no small amount of pride. To add to her reasoning that she should tag along, she summoned up her trusty piko-piko hammer, "And I can take care of myself too."

'_Stubborn'_ the one worded thought was shared amongst the group. Not that they were any better themselves though, and they weren't in any better of a position to argue either.

"Alright…" Alicia relented in defeat, they could use a guest party member anyway, "It's not like we can stop you without creating a headache."

"Yippee!" The pink hedgehog's energy level shot through the metaphorical roof in excitement. Immediately the others had started to regret the decision.

With one more zone to go, the team has added another member to their plight. It won't be easy, as Eggman would be sure to throw out all of the stops against them. Not to mention the possibility of a final trump card. Will Amy Rose's aid be enough to deal with Eggman's final zone, or will the mad scientist win out in the end?

**[To be continued]**

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 20]<strong>

Author's note: Sorry for the long delay folks. I've just had one thing pop up after another. Surprise anniversary visit for my grandparents, schoolwork; and I burned through my thanksgiving break awfully quick too. But, fear not! I shall continue on! Even better news, my Fall Semester at UVU should come to a close in a few weeks with Finals week and Winter Break for the holidays. I'll not only keep this story going, but also try to focus on my Knight of the Night Sky and Lyrical Record stories as well. I haven't forgotten about them, this one's just kinda given my tunnel vision. Alright! Read, review, identify cleverly placed references, you know the scthick…


	21. Chapter 21

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in the finale to the Little Planet arc. Hope everyone likes this, been hearing some good stuff on the reviews and comments I've been getting. Usual disclaimers apply; I don't own Sonic or Nanoha.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[Uminari City, Japan]  
>[Residential District, Harlaown Residence]<br>[Local Time: 1020 hours]  
>[BGM: "The Red Wings" Final Fantasy IV (Remastered)]<strong>

From the makeshift yet effective command center of the modest home in Uminari, three individuals had their attention fixated on the screens above them. The screens would display information recently taken from a live feed set up on the devices. Lindy, Amy (Limietta) and Chrono carefully analyzed all that they could. The recent race with Metal Sonic was most intriguing for the time being, and for good reason.

"Perhaps we've underestimated this doctor" Lindy commented neutrally, "His creation had put on a valiant, yet losing effort."

"It still lost to the blue hedgehog" Chrono wasn't about to openly disagree with his mother, but he still held his own reservations in context of the events that had transpired, "A familiar at that as well."

"Are you still going on about that?" The older woman scolded, though lightly, as she most likely felt that a few facts had still eluded her son's awareness, "You are aware that Sonic-kun was fighting this "Eggman" character prior to becoming a familiar"

"I am, but that's also my point" Chrono explained his side of the argument, "Considering how little magic he used in the race, it could be said that he wouldn't have needed the magic power from his mistress to win, and that's why I believe we shouldn't place much attention on this foe"

"Chrono-kun is jealous that Sonic-kun's getting more action than he is." Amy (Limietta) teasingly chimed in, but not without her own argument, "Besides, Sonic-kun has also recently noted that this "Eggman" character has improved since they last went against one another"

"I am not jealous" The boy enforcer shot back, rather too quickly though to admit the denial that he could be jealous of a familiar. He certainly was not jealous about how much action said familiar was getting as well while he was stuck riding a desk chair.

"Enough!" the admiral interjected, effectively ceasing the petty argument between the two. "While Chrono is correct in regards to the established fact that Eggman may not be much of an adversary now, Amy is also correct in that this man has been able to improve his machines with time and I'd much rather deal with him now before he becomes a problem big enough to warrant "official" Bureau attention."

"Then what are we going to do about the girl?" Chrono inquired in reference to the mysterious mage identifying herself as Alicia, "If she is who she claims she is, then we've just found Precia's biological daughter."

"Her story would appear to check out" Lindy noted, "But until Precia's trial is finished, neither she nor Fate are to step foot on Mid-Childa."

"You know the Bureau will want a report on this in person" The enforcer countered rather quickly, "Our ship can't stay in the orbit of a Non-Administrated world much longer"

"I know, that's why I'm going to take the Arthra back to Mid with her crew. I need to convince the higher ups that our stay on this world needs to be extended." The admiral already had an answer for that, and gave the two teens sharp looks to deter any argument from forming in her next sentence, "And you two are going to remain here to watch over them while I'm gone."

"What are we going to do about Fate-chan and Alicia-chan?" Amy inquired, she too wasn't about to disobey a direct order from her superior, but she was still concerned about the aforementioned duo.

"They can either stay here or with the Takamachi family" A simple, yet effective answer was given by the woman, she wasn't above a small teasing jab at her subordinates either, "I'm certain I can trust you two not to make too much of a mess of the place while I'm absent, right?"

"Yes ma'am!" Amy and Chrono agreed wholeheartedly; the former of the two couldn't help but notice the knowing expression on her superior's face, and she was slightly unnerved when the woman appeared to give her a small wink.

'_Oh crap…'_ the brunette teen gulped a little, _'What was that for?!'_

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 21<br>Little Planet's Final Fever**

* * *

><p><strong>[Little Planet: Metallic Madness]<br>[BGM: "Metallic Madness" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

It didn't take long into the decent of Eggman's base on Little Planet for the group to already start second guessing their decision to allow Amy Rose to help them out. The pink girl had tried to take every opportunity she could get to stick close to the object of her affection, Sonic. Her clinginess had annoyed Arf within seconds while Nanoha was subjected to the evil eye glare almost every minute. The only one who found some amusement in all of this was Alicia, and that was because she found Fate's protective nature of the white-clad mage from earth to be quite cute.

Despite the nuisance that Amy's presence had caused, they had kept her around because of the productive results she had presented them. The pink hedgehog was able to guide them through the first part of Doctor Eggman's base, and the abstract differences in the environment between the zones prior and the evil base zone was plainly obvious for all to see.

Unlike the other areas, where one could still see some portion of the environment in the background at some point; Metallic Madness was a dimension ruled by technology with a hue of techno-green. The metallic flooring had built-in turbines and circular saws, leaving little doubt that Eggman had intended to pull out all the tricks he had at his disposal to stop them.

Among the traps in Eggman's base included an odd contraption that was best described as a pole on wheels. This pole contraption had spinning blades on the top and just above the wheels. The blades would alternate between the ground and air level. Despite the headache generated in keeping track of the blades, the group was still able to find creative means of avoiding it. The mages and familiars were able to fly in between the blades while Amy used her hammer to boost her jump height enough to scale over the contraption. While it was effective, the others noted, to Amy's annoyance, that her approach would've had her hurt if she was in a more constricted area.

"Sheesh!" Arf grumbled in annoyance, "Someone's been busy."

"And smart" Alicia added, "I haven't seen any of the time travel signs in here yet."

"At least there aren't that many robots here yet" Sonic noted in optimism, "Eggman figured that we'd have enough trouble with his deathtraps."

Despite the grumblings about Eggman's design and how often the traps had threatened the safety of the others, the team was still able to make their way to one of the Past signs. The bigger challenge, however, was trying to build up enough speed when passing through the gate in order to initiate the big jump. Their nerves built more when there was a pause of action after they passed, they were fearful that the speed they had wasn't enough. That case was proven to be false rather quickly as their environment warped around them and the familiar feeling passed over before the warp.

* * *

><p><strong>[Metallic Madness –Past]<br>[BGM: "Metallic Madness (Past)" Sonic CD]**

The Past of the zone was much like the present except the factory and base of Eggman's operations was still under construction. Despite the phase of construction, all of the machines and computers were intact and functional, bearing a lavender hue to contrast the green from the Present. Building girders and cranes were visible about the walls, ceiling and floors. As the group arrived, they took a moment to ensure they were all present and accounted for. Much to the dismay of the others, Amy Rose had managed to keep up with them through the warp.

"This place is full of cranes and machinery" Alicia said with a not-so-pleased frown on her face, "He ripped up the whole area!"

"Eggman doesn't really care about that" Sonic shrugged, "He only focuses on getting what he wants."

"He starts the construction of the base here so that way it would be present in the present and future zones" Fate noted the thought-up logic behind the placement, "He really cares for this base"

A loud alarm interrupted the musings of the group. Evidently, the security system in the construction site of the base was not only active, but it picked up the presence of the intruders. Sonic had to quickly take back what he said about the lack of robots, because the alarm had drawn their attention and soon the team was surrounded by the bug-themed machinations of the doctor.

The robots here not only were themed like insects, but also modified with weapons. The beetle robots had circular saws attached to their front; the wasps had flailing maces dangling from behind. Sonic recognized the design of the armored, rolling bugs from his previous adventure and had to groan a bit.

"Take back what I said about the lack of robots" the blue hedgehog said quickly before the others, sans Amy Rose, could call him out on it, "Here they come!"

Amy Rose was quickly made aware of the differences of power between herself and the girls whom her object of love interest had befriended. Sure, she could take care of herself and hold her own against 3 robots at once, but seeing the Nanoha (whom she still disliked), Fate and Alicia each take out 6 in one blast had given her a feeling similar to inferiority. Her respect and admiration for Sonic grew in seeing him take out 6 on his wave, but at the same time, Arf was able to do the same and still give her the nervous, intimidated feeling.

'_I should've stayed home today.'_ The pink hedgehog grumbled internally.

The mass numbers of robots had made it interesting, but still the group was easily able to make their way to the robot-generating machine and Metal Sonic Projector. Both objective items were demolished rapidly as well. While the actions were effective, Eggman still had plenty of robots about as they were in the metaphorical hornet's nest.

The biggest challenge from there was getting to the Future so they could end Eggman's plot once and for all. Though the number of robots had greatly decreased due to the robot machine's destruction, they still had to deal with the death traps and spinning blade poles. Not to mention they just had to take the trickiest route through the base.

There was even a part through the course when the corridors threatened to cut them off as they were far too big to even squeeze through. Amy Rose pointed out that she noticed this on her way in despite the Doctor's robots taking her through a different route. She implied that the good old Doctor had installed a shrink ray machine of sorts and it was designed to help any of his robots that happened to take a wrong turn get back to the base. The idea was pondered for a moment.

"So a conveniently placed shrink ray is our only way to get through the corridor now." Sonic was immediately skeptical and mistrusting of the idea, "I don't buy it. Egghead's already laced this route with enough traps to burn at least one extra life if we weren't careful."

"Well, if it's the only way…" Fate didn't seem to like the idea any more than anyone else did, but she figured she'd have to live with it so long as there was a way to return back to normal size.

"Or we could just blast our way through. If the base gets destroyed, so what, that's what we're trying to do anyway" the blue hedgehog sent a knowing glance and a smirk at his master and her device, "And I think a certain device knows what I'm talking about…"

"_**Divine Buster!"**_ Sure enough, Raising Heart was in sync with the idea.

"Eeeeh?!" Amy Rose was, needless to say, quite shocked and surprised to find that the gem in the white-clad girl's staff could speak, "It TALKED?!"

"Yes, it can talk, we've established this in the first chapter" Sonic deadpanned, "Now can we blast the wall and move on already?"

Nanoha was already a step ahead of her familiar when the question was asked, as she had already charged up the energy required for the spell in the familiar pink sphere at the tip of Raising Heart. Amy could only stand by helpless and watch as the brown-haired human girl literally tore a huge hole through the walls of the corridor. The pink hedgehog wasn't sure what to be more concerned for: the fact that a human who didn't look much older than she was had this power in her, or the fact that no one else, even her blue crush, seemed fazed by the action.

With that obstacle out of the way, the group was able to find and utilize the Future sign. For all of the grumbling that Amy made, she still was able to use her memory to guide them to such. From there, it was the all too familiar warping feeling from time travel that arguably could've grown on the group, if only the jump arguably wouldn't have been their last.

**[Eyecatch: The Nanoha star logo and Sonic Team logo overlap one another briefly a few times before flying over to the right side and the Sonic Team logo comfortably fitting inside the star. The background would change between a sky-blue and a cherry blossom pink as the story subtitle, written in the correct language, appeared]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Eyecatch: chibi versions of Sonic and Nanoha were seen bathing together in an onsen while chibi versions of Fate, Arf and Alicia were peeking on them with their heads over the wall. The method worked, at least until the wall broke and the trio were sent right into the water. There was an awkward pause for about a few seconds while everyone featured were blushing cute shades of red, but they laughed it off in the end. Around the time of the laughter the story logo appeared on the right side]<strong>

**[Metallic Madness: Good Future]  
>[BGM: "Metallic Madness (Good Future)" Sonic CD (JPNEU)]**

Upon arriving in the future of the zone, the team was graced by arguably the most beautiful locations they've ever seen in a lifetime. The land of the zone had been converted into what appeared to be a mix between a huge botanical garden and a futuristic shopping mall. Futuristic structures of a utopian design could be seen across the horizon. Animals could be seen dancing and prancing freely amidst the indoor corridors.

"Alright, I'll admit it" Sonic spoke in his casual tone, yet still holding respect and some admiration for the sight, "This is one of the prettiest sights I've ever seen."

"Even Mid-Childa would be hard pressed to top this" Alicia was just about as surprised as everyone else, she didn't go past the Speedway often enough to check out the particular zone, "Beautiful and peaceful."

"Still dangerous…" Fate noted sadly as she gestured to the remaining deathtraps, which had taken a more peaceful color due to the time distortion, "Traps everywhere"

"They don't look so threatening now though with the bright colors" Nanoha noted optimistically, "That should give us confidence"

Despite the threat of the deathtraps, the team continued to progress. The only regret that could've been of note was that they couldn't slow down and enjoy the peaceful background more. The metallic terrain seemed to just fly by with the swiftness in everyone's step. The only thing about the traps that made some interest was one of the self-destructing bomb robots that came close to hitting an aerial Nanoha in the splash, but Fate covered her with a Defenser.

It didn't take much longer for them to encounter the mad scientist once more. To everyone's brief surprise, Eggman's mobile unit was not fitted with anything special and just appeared as its usual self. Though that didn't really mean much as the doctor could easily arm his mech to the teeth with a press of a button; it didn't help that Eggman had an air of calmness about him.

"We meet again" The doctor, very calmly, addressed the interlopers, "I hope you've enjoyed your pleasure cruise."

"Awe, no childish tantrums?" Sonic chided, noting the calm demeanor and hoping to break it, "The calm bit doesn't suit you at all, Baldy McNosehair"

"You'll learn to silence your taunts" Eggman countered and started to press a few buttons, causing some activity from his Egg-Mobile, "And if you don't do it yourself, I'll shut you all up… permanently."

"With what?" the blue hedgehog decided to play the ignorant one and ask, "Your usual mech? That thing wouldn't stand a chance against us"

The doctor had a smug grin on his face as he pressed a few buttons on the console of his Egg-mobile. His mobile entered a spherical machine that had an odd design of sorts. The overall mech was spherical and appeared to be quite armored. 4 rectangular blades protruded from the sides at 90 degree angles to one another, sorta like a plus sign or an x-shape. The blades rotated clockwise, effectively making the machine a large saw.

"How do you like this?" Eggman cockily grinned as his machine stuck to the ceiling and moved back and forth, "My final trump card. The Final Fever"

* * *

><p><strong>[VS: Final Fever]<br>[BGM: "Final Fever" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

The machine kept to the pattern of moving back-and-forth along the ceiling of the room. Because of that, the aerial Nanoha, Fate and Alicia had to stick to the ground or risk testing how sharp those blades were. The aerial mages made an attempt to fire off some magic rounds on the way down, but they held varying degrees of failure. The Photon Lancers from Fate and Alicia were negated by the strong armor while Nanoha's Divine Shooter rounds were deflected by the blades. Luckily the deflected shots were evaded by the fighters on the ground.

"Our magic shots are no good" Nanoha observed nervously, "Very thick armor on that machine; any normal shots are rendered useless"

"And we can't get any closer to him either" Sonic added and drew a guess from how the blades handled the magic, "I get the feeling even our best defensive shields won't be able to protect us from the blades."

"He probably won't give us any time to prepare any bombardment spells" Fate noted the rapid back-and-forth movement in the Doctor's latest contraption, "We'll have to use melee or our rapid fire spells"

"Then we'll stick to the ground" Alicia declared, "He can't hit us when we're down here."

"I wouldn't be so sure" Eggman countered vilely as he pressed a few more buttons on his console, "Let's see how well you can move"

Upon the command, the mech slowly descended to the ground level, separating the group of 6 into 3 with Sonic, Nanoha and Arf on one side and Alicia, Fate and Amy Rose on the other. The doctor's tactic in the approach appeared to have the intent of crushing them with the blunt side of the blades. The biggest flaw in the approach was that the armor had severely reduced the speed of the machine, making the attack easy to avoid. When he took his leap upward, Sonic had thought that he had spotted something in the joints of the blades, but he had to return to the ground level before he could try anything.

Eggman was quick to change tactics as he centered his machine on the ceiling. The blades detached from the mech and fell down on their sides. While they weren't difficult to avoid, the tactic was pretty clever on the doctor's part as the blades would've most likely interfered with one another if they came down on the broad side.

Undeterred by the evasive maneuvers the interlopers were able to take in avoiding his attacks, the doctor brought all four blades back to him and descended a few feet until he was in the middle of the area. With a smug grin and a few more buttons pressed, the doctor willed the blades to extend outward and press against the walls of the area. While it limited the field of movement and separated the group into the previous 2 trios, the tactic confirmed to Sonic something he had thought he seen before: a weak point in the machine.

Grinning himself, Sonic drew his twin kodachi swords and slashed at the exposed joint of the blade closest to him, which was separating the group. Sure enough, the strike severed the blade from the joint and not only rendered it useless, but also expose the weak point in the armor for a quick follow-up Divine Shooter shot from Nanoha, whom had caught on to what her familiar had seen quickly.

"Gah! Pull up! Pull up!" Eggman quickly pulled his machine up to the ceiling again and spun the blades in a defensive pattern once more before he could take any further damage. Unfortunately the move wasn't without consequence as a vital weak point had already been exposed.

"Looks like those blades are the weak points in the machine" Sonic noted, "If we're lucky, we'll have a brief window when he tries to crush us with them. Otherwise we'll have to wait for him to extend the blades"

"Don't get so confident just yet" The scientist sneered as he continued to work his contraption, "One hit isn't going to matter much when I take you out"

The doctor rapidly descended his tri-bladed mech down to the ground, only instead of going after the trio with Sonic; he went the other way and rushed for Fate, Alicia and Amy, hoping to crush them. Unfortunately his method not only failed, but the absence of the fourth blade exposed a weak point on top of the machine and Fate was just lucky enough with Bardiche to land a solid slice to an exposed joint with the device in Scythe Form, reducing his blade number down to 2.

"You little…" whatever Eggman had meant to say was cut off as he had to quickly pull up to the ceiling and resume the back and forth movement. Even though he had only half the amount of blades to use at his disposal, the doctor compensated with adding more power to the ones left, making them spin even faster.

It wasn't long before Eggman went on the offensive again. He once again centered the mech in the middle and flung the blades at the group. With only two blades left, he had the advantage of sending them at the team on the wide side. Not that it was of much effect, as they were easily able to jump to avoid them.

The doctor was quick to call the blades back to him and engage in another attack. With more room to move he went to the right and extended the blades to hopefully catch Sonic, Nanoha and Arf off guard. His attack not only failed poorly, but also left his other side exposed to a few slices from Alicia's paper fan. The blade count was reduced to one and the attack was followed up by a Photon Lancer from Arf at the side that the shorter blonde had just cut.

"Systems Critical!" Very quickly, the doctor's calm demeanor had been replaced by nerves and fear. Within a matter of minutes, Eggman had to witness a downfall at the hands of his enemies and his best attempts to prevent it were thwarted at almost every angle.

Eggman was not ready to throw in the towel just yet though and he had one final trick up his sleeve to use. Directing all remaining power to the one blade, he made his mech drop down with the lone blade acting as a spring. He was clearly hoping to stomp the interlopers flat. It was all or nothing at this point and Eggman had no choice but to risk it.

Unfortunately, the recurring theme of failure was evident and enforced as Amy had taken the opportunity to score a powerful slam on the remaining blade's joint with her hammer. A follow-up attack from Nanoha had not only disarmed the machine, but also created a chain reaction that caused the machine and the base linked to it to slowly destruct itself and crumble.

* * *

><p><strong>[Final Boss Neutralized]<br>[No BGM]**

"This whole place is going down!" Sonic shouted to the others, "We better skedaddle before we go down with it!"

"What about the last Time Stone?" Arf asked, inquiring about the crimson red gem that had jettisoned in the midst of the chain reaction. The wolf familiar currently had it in her sight and wasn't sure what to do with it

"Grab it and go" Alicia quickly shouted the order, "But hurry, we don't have much time before this base comes down on us."

With a rather dumb nod, Arf complied and made all haste to follow her blue hedgehog counterpart in fleeing from the crumbling base of the scientist. Fate and Alicia had quickly followed suit while Nanoha had to take a brief delay to grab the pink hedgehog and secure her in a bridal carry. While Amy Rose had mentally lamented her regret that she couldn't have been carried by her blue hero, her self-preservation due to the fact that the white-clad human could fly and carry her had quickly doused the regret.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth]<br>[South Island: Never Lake]  
>[Local Time: 1105 hours]<br>[BGM: "Believe in yourself (Ending Theme)" Sonic CD (JPN/EU)]**

Very quickly, five blurs had rushed down to the surface of the lake. 2 were yellow, one was pink, another was orange and the last one was blue. The team of mages had successfully vacated the base just as it went down. The chain anchoring the planet to the lake had broken apart and the ugly shape of Eggman's face in the mountain side had crumbled apart as well.

It all happened rather quickly and the visual feed that Lindy and the others in the base at Uminari were given displayed a huge explosion from the mountain where Eggman's face used to be. The unconfirmed presence of their deployed mages drew some concern to Admiral Lindy Harlaown's face.

"Nanoha! Fate!" The woman almost yelled through the communication feed as she tried to hail the two mages or at least their devices, "We're seeing a huge explosion on our side, are you guys alright?"

"Hai!" Nanoha, with little delay, replied back to the admiral to assure her the confirmation of survival, "We're all here; we managed to get out before the whole place went down"

"That's a relief" the woman could briefly be heard sighing in relief, "That was close, but a job well done"

Communication was halted briefly as more activity brewed from where Eggman's base used to be on Little Planet. A small dot, followed by a stream of smoke had jettisoned from the small planet. It didn't take a genius to determine that Eggman had been able to use the destruction of his base to escape.

"Ack! Not quite" Sonic noted with a groan, "Eggman's escaping"

"Leave him; we don't have the resources to deal with him right now." Lindy ordered rather quickly, "For the moment, make sure that Little Planet is safe and secure."

Those who could hear her nodded in reply. The lone exception, Amy Rose, was slightly confused to see and hear the others talk to a mysterious woman from some sort of a floating screen. Neither she, nor anyone else could dwell on the thought as more activity was visible from Little Planet, this time the reaction chained to the Time Stones in their grasp.

"Whoa!" Sonic was the first to point out anything as he and the others who had a stone in their possession felt them almost get violently ripped from their hold, "The Time Stones!"

All seven Time Stones emitted their mysterious, yet powerful glow as they started to form streams of their respective color of light and head right back to Little Planet. The sight was truly a marvelous one to behold as the planet started to give off excess amounts of energy, no doubt from the destruction of Eggman's machines, which were draining its power.

"Pretty..." Alicia admitted in some admiration.

Little Planet wasn't through with amazing everyone just yet. Light-blue particles of light started to form and play around the planet as if they were alive. Shapes started to form from the light particles; the shapes had started to resemble faces. In particular, Sonic, Fate, Nanoha, Alicia and Arf were depicted, almost as if the planet knew who had saved it.

"Those look just like us!" Nanoha noted in surprise and wonder.

"Guess it wants to thank us" Sonic had tried to give some reason behind it, not that he had any clue about it either because he didn't.

The only regret Amy Rose had was that her depiction wasn't shown in the light show. Not that, she, or anyone else could ponder that as Little Planet gave off another mysterious glow and slowly rise upward into the sky. The planet would appear to continue its ascent for a brief moment before it disappeared in a flashy display.

There was a brief moment of silence amongst the mages, familiars and pink hedgehog tagalong. No one was capable of any words or thoughts as they were all amazed by the beautiful scene that had just taken place. The silence wasn't long to last and someone had to break it at some point.

"It's gone…" Sonic was the first to break the silence, "That's certainly new."

"Guess it needed to recharge" Nanoha had a guess, but she didn't have much confidence behind it. Another thing dawned upon her as well as the white-clad girl realized something she had to ask, "Wait, what about Alicia-chan?"

The mention of the shorter blonde had everyone turn to face the area where the aforementioned girl had landed. Sure enough, the girl was still there; alive, present and accounted for. The shorter blonde had the sense of humor to smile, wave and act as cutely as possible to remind everyone that she was there.

"As if someone as cute as me can be held back by that world" the short blonde said with a grin, "Besides, I'm not going to let anything get in my way of spending time with my new adorable little sister"

"Alicia…" Fate said with a brief phase of stars in her eyes, perhaps starting to admire the girl that had accepted her as a sibling, uncaring for the cloning part.

"I hate to interrupt these types of cute moments, but we're still on the clock" The woman noted, "I want everyone to come over here and report in"

"Everyone?" Alicia couldn't help but ask for the clarification

"Everyone, including you" Lindy gave a flat look to the short blonde for a brief moment before giving an even more serious glance at the pink hedgehog, "And you"

"Huh?!" Amy Rose was completely confused. She had opened her mouth to speak something in retort, but the glare kept her mouth shut, "R-right"

"Good!" Lindy said with a grin, "I'll await your return at the base in Uminari"

The others could only nod and confirm the reception of the orders before the woman cut off the communication feed there. It seemed that all was settled and the group could return to Japan to debrief. If only it were that easy.

Before anyone could so much as take a step forward, they found all ground and air paths cut off. A fair number of animals local to South Island had surrounded them and blocked any means of escape. Birds, squirrels, turtles and bunnies were only a fair selection of the animals that had barred the escape paths. The ones surrounded were completely confused, but there was one thing they were sure of. None of the animals looked happy, or even friendly to see them.

"Great…" Sonic groaned in annoyance, "Just great."

**[To Be Continued!]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Ending theme: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]<strong>

**[End of Chapter 21]**

Author's Note: Sorry for the delay... had to deal with Finals... but I now have a few weeks off for the holidays... Hopefully I can get something going while I'm dealing with said holiday break. Next up! Some aftermaths and probably an intermission chapter before I go on to the next arc... A's…. read, review, the works. Loving some feedback please.


	22. Chapter 22

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in the aftermath chapter to the Little Planet arc of Lyrical Familiar. I will use this chapter to start clearing up any loose ends while the next one will bridge into A's. While the next one won't go directly into A's, it'll start setting things up so I can start the A's arc in the following chapter. After this chapter, I believe I'll go on a hiatus of sorts and finish up the current arcs on the other two stories I have been working on. Let's do it!

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth: Japan]<br>[South Island: Never Lake]  
>[Local Time: 1107 hours]<br>[No BGM]**

"What a way to celebrate a birthday" Sonic quipped in annoyance as he took in the situation, "And it's not even over yet"

The young blue hedgehog had good cause for his feelings on the current situation. He, Nanoha, Fate, Arf, Alicia and Amy Rose were surrounded by a fair number of the local animal residents of South Island. Apparently the animals may have either missed the light show that Little Planet had put on prior to disappearing or didn't care enough to focus on it rather than the human majority of the party before them. As they had surrounded the group after Little Planet had disappeared, the latter was most likely probable.

"Today was your birthday?" Alicia Testarossa, who up until a few hours ago was a stray from Little Planet and was unaware of anything that had happened within the past 26 years that was her tenure on the planet, was somewhat surprised at what her blue ally had said.

"Yup" Sonic confirmed with little more than a shrug of his shoulders, "It started great with the amusing wake-up call, but having to deal with Eggman had a sour note."

While Alicia noticed the blushing reactions from Nanoha, Fate and Arf at Sonic's statement, any comment she had thought of was never voiced at the time. Several bird caws and dog growls had served as a reminder to the current situation.

"Yes I know you're still there" Sonic suddenly shot a glare at a fair few of them, "You don't need to remind us of that."

"Um..." Nanoha couldn't help but inquire of Sonic, Arf and Amy as they were more animal-like of the group, "Could you understand what they're saying? Maybe we could negotiate something peacefully."

"I kinda understand their language…" Amy Rose nodded with little confidence, "But they're speaking in a dialect that's too fast for me to make out."

"I think I can understand them a little better" Arf noted, but wasn't any more confident, considering she was far too "foreign" of an wolf to be of much use in terms of being diplomatic with the South Island animals, "But there's no way they'll listen to me."

"Guess that just leaves me" The blue hedgehog noted about himself in annoyance, "I understand them perfectly, but this will be tricky."

"Try to get them to get a spokesperson" Nanoha suggested with some growing confidence, knowing how powerful convincing the right person in your favor can be, "If you can reason with them, they could get the others to back off."

"I was thinking that too" Sonic nodded in confirmation and quickly set to do just that. Just about wondering how in the world he got into the middle of all of this, _'This will be fun...'_

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 22<br>Epilogue of a Planet**

* * *

><p><strong>[South Island: Never Lake]<br>[Local Time: 1110 hours]  
>[BGM: "eeto desu ne" Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha OST]<strong>

Despite the mass number of South Islanders that had surrounded the group, it didn't take long for a spokesperson to come forth to be able to initiate any form of negotiations. The representative was a brown female squirrel who appeared to carry herself quite appropriately despite holding little to no form of humanity like Sonic or Amy.

As Arf had come in second in the way of recognizing the shared animal "tongue" that Sonic was able to understand from the South Islanders, she was quickly given the task of interpreting what they say to Nanoha, Fate, Alicia and Amy Rose. If nothing else, the situation would've been most humorous if not for the gravity of the situation.

The hilarity was furthered when Sonic and the squirrel started "speaking", or to the human ears, trading cute squeaking noises. Regardless of whatever came from these "negotiations" there was little doubt that Sonic would take a hit or two to his pride.

"Alright, the squirrel started off by asking Sonic where he has been since "the evil Human" attacked the main island." Arf translated in almost a play-by-play format, "While Sonic replied that he had been on a self-imposed "vacation" to visit the world."

"I think we can assume that the "evil Human" she's talking about is Eggman" Nanoha commented in reference and to help Alicia, Fate and Arf in understanding some of the context, "A week or so before I met Yuuno, Doctor Eggman tried to take over South Island with a fleet of robots; and Sonic had stopped him"

"Arf and I caught a little bit of that story on the local news from the apartment building we had when we had first arrived" Fate noted in memory, but was quick to shrug as if it had mattered little to her, "But at the time neither he nor the story held much relevance to our goals so we had little interest in getting involved."

"They're arguing now, this didn't take long" Arf would really have liked to say she was surprised, but in reality, she wasn't, "She's asking Sonic why he has brought humans to the island, especially with the "evil Human's" actions still fresh on everyone's minds. Sonic just countered with sarcastically asking if she and the others had missed Little Planet lighting up like fireworks in the middle of summer."

"Japan has festivals during the summer almost every weekend" Nanoha elaborated a speculation of what her familiar was referring to, "These festivals have fireworks shows and they're really beautiful to see."

"I think I'd like to see that sometime" Fate was honestly interested in the idea, although it was also arguable that she was also just as interested in seeing said festivals with Nanoha.

"I'd really like to take you there too" Nanoha easily agreed to the idea as well and was quite happy to think about being able to take her new friends out to have fun and watch fireworks at a festival, granted they were going to be in Japan, "I hope you can stay here for the summer."

"I hope so too" Fate agreed, making a small mental note to ask a certain admiral about it later.

"Don't forget me" Alicia cut in, more-or-less amused with seeing her new "younger" sister practically falling head-over-heels for the cute brunette in white; had anyone been paying more attention, they might have made a little note to keep a closer eye on her.

Before Nanoha could say anything to assure Alicia that she wouldn't be forgotten, the blue hedgehog of her familiar acting as a negotiator had quickly rushed over and gripped his mistress by the wrist and taken her over to the spokes-squirrel. Nanoha, for the most part had the sense to appear surprised, but recovered enough to smile cutely and presentable.

"This is a human girl who saved my life on the first night I came to the human land" The blue hedgehog switched to the Japanese language, knowing the squirrel and the other animals had the ability to at least understand it even if they couldn't speak it, "She didn't have to do it, but she did out of the goodness of her heart."

The squirrel gave a suspicious glance to the human girl in white. Suspicion that was well understood, though and she'd size the girl up before speaking in her squeaky tongue to the blue hedgehog in an interrogative manner. Her question was only understood by the hedgehog and Arf, but the others present could note a slight absence of malice.

"She wants to hear that from you, Nanoha-chan" Sonic translated to his mage, "They don't need to know about the specifics, but if you tell them your motives and show them how pure your intentions are, you should be fine."

"Eh? Are you sure?" The girl didn't seem quite confident as she inquired of the hedgehog, but when she saw the serious look in his eyes that wouldn't take any negative answer she'd sigh and take a step forward, "Ano… I know that you guys aren't quite fond of us humans…"

Annoyance dipped into the squirrel's expression as she squeaked. There was no need for Sonic or Arf to translate what she had said that time. Everyone present, even Fate, couldn't help but slap their respective hands, paws, talons, etc. against their foreheads in exasperation.

"But not all humans are like that! Not all of us are mean or have some drive for conquest" The girl, undeterred by the annoyed reaction, kept up with the attempt of making her case, "Eggman was just a bad egg out of the bunch."

The unintentional joke on Nanoha's part earned her a few amused reactions from the rest of the group, but it was likely that she didn't notice or realize the joke she had made. The other animals of the group had slowly started to absorb the words the human girl had said, but as the squirrel could attest to, it was still a long way from fully convincing them all.

**[BGM Insert: "Rydia's Theme" Final Fantasy IV (DS/PSP)]**

"Sonic-kun's met a lot of humans in Japan and none of them, my friends and family included, could condone the actions that Doctor Eggman has taken against you" The girl continued with the aforementioned blue hedgehog nodding along in agreement. "Sonic-kun was stubborn to accept their pity, but we all felt sorry that Eggman had to attack your peaceful, beautiful lands."

Nanoha paused for a moment to catch her breath and form her thoughts. She wasn't exactly prepared to handle being put on the spot in the current situation, so she no doubt had to improvise in any way she could. To her surprise, the other animals had appeared to ease up on their hostilities, making it evident that while the animals may not be able to speak her tongue, they were able to understand most of the words or at least the feelings behind them.

"Please..." Nanoha said after her pause, loud enough for all to hear, including the slowly-turning squirrel, "I know there's a way we can all get along, but this isn't the way. We don't want to hurt you, so please"

The squirrel, whom everyone was trying to convince took in the human's words and looked about her kin. Seeing the confused looks on their expressions, she sent a neutral gaze at the two blondes and oversized wolf. The trio had nothing to say, merely shrugging in indifference, not like they had much to add, the world was alien to them.

With a small shrug, the squirrel let out a series of squeaks to the others present. Though only Sonic and Arf could understand them, the fact that neither hedgehog nor wolf had reacted in a defensive manner was a good sign. Sure enough the animals slowly began to retreat and break off the formation that was set for the ambush.

"Thank you" Nanoha said with a polite bow in gratitude. The squirrel would look at her with an expression of surprise before shrugging and joining her kin in going off to attend to whatever business they had.

"Well…" Sonic broke his brief silence with a word and a shrug, "That was interesting."

"Yeah..." Nanoha herself wasn't quite sure what to make of their situation or the resolution either.

"At any rate, Lindy-san's expecting us" Fate noted, "And we're late."

The mages and familiars had prepared themselves for a quick flight over to the Harlaown residence in Uminari. However, a certain pink hedgehog was not about to allow them to forget about her.

"Hey!" Amy Rose called out as the others had prepared their own variants of flight spells, "You're not going to just leave me behind, are you?"

"Why not?" Alicia was the first to ask. The shortest human of the group turned and faced the pink hedgehog with an unnerving look of annoyance on her face, "Why should we let you come with us?"

"I helped you out, didn't I?" The pink hedgehog countered quickly, "Shouldn't that convince you?"

"Half of the time you were kidnapped and the other half was spent giving Sonic weird looks" Alicia replied flatly again, her face in a bit of a deadpan, though she was unable to hide her annoyance, "While you did help us through Baldy Nosehair's base, we probably could've found our own way in without your help"

"Well, maybe Sonic will vouch for me" The pink hedgehog grinned and looked in the direction of where she last saw her blue idol, "Right. Sonic?"

Not only did she receive no answer, but the hedgehog he had tried to ask was actually nowhere in sight. He wasn't the only one missing as well, as Nanoha too was missing from her line of sight. Not that it was particularly a negative thing for Amy; it would've probably given here a better chance at acquainting herself with her idol.

Completely confused, Amy turned around to face the short human she had just spoken with, only to find her missing as well. In fact, everyone she had just been with had vanished. She frantically spent the next few seconds turning her head back and forth in hopes of finding the group her idol was in. No dice, they were gone.

"Wait, Sonic!" The pink hedgehog shouted her idol's name out into the sky, but she was basically talking to the air and was given no response other than the sound of her voice echoing off some of the mountain faces. If the ones she called out to had heard, they pretended not to notice.

* * *

><p><strong>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Residential District: Harlaown Residence]  
>[Local Time: 1130 hours]<br>[BGM: "Welcome to Our Town" Final Fantasy IV (DS/PSP)]**

The group of five had sped so fast in their flight over to the admiral's residence in the city that they had to put a fair amount of effort into braking to avoid crashing into the house. After they arrived, the next minute or so was spent to catch their breaths and regain their respective senses. After all, it wouldn't do for the group to meet Lindy out of breath and exhausted. And for Alicia, it was her first time meeting the aforementioned admiral and a good first impression would make the introductions go much more smoothly.

Upon entering the house, the group of five found the admiral that they were to report to calmly seated on a couch in the living room. She didn't appear to have been there for long as there was a cup of freshly poured tea in her hand and a calm look on her face.

"Welcome back, everyone" Sure enough; the woman calmly greeted the returning mages and familiars with a soft, calm expression, "Congratulations on a job well done"

"Sorry we couldn't get here earlier" Sonic was quick to make an apology, hoping it would do some good in the event that the woman's calm demeanor wasn't enough to save them from a tardiness lecture, "Some of the locals wanted to ambush us and say 'hi'."

"I suspected as much" The woman merely nodded and explained her reasoning, "They were rather territorial with the local authorities that were sent there from Japan if I read the dispatch correctly. It was only the fact that they humans had kept their distance and stayed out of anyone's way that kept things from escalating."

"I think Eggman's attack on Little Planet did that job though" the blue hedgehog went on, "But we actually managed to calm them down without blasting them to a fifth dimension."

"Good" Lindy nodded, "And who persuaded them?"

"Well I did first as I was the only one among us who could listen to their tongue flawlessly" Sonic replied, "Then I had Nanoha-chan take over."

"And judging from your faces, I'm guessing she persuaded them without violence" The woman queried. The others nodded firmly and truthfully, which drew a nod from her as well, "Excellent, Eggman's actions have given us humans a bad name with them. Taking any violent action would've escalated tensions further.

"Anyways, I understand there's someone new for me to meet?" Lindy was quick to change the topic to a more joyous one, "Someone whose aid was crucial in resolving this little incident?"

"Yes, ma'am" Alicia took the unspoken cue and stepped forward. She had done her best to appear polite and formal, "I was living on Little Planet at the time, and when I saw them fighting to keep the enemies off the planet I joined them."

"And you would be the real Alicia Testarossa if my understanding is correct?" The woman went on with the same topic, hoping to actually confirm Alicia's identity as genuine. The little girl had nodded in firm, honest agreement, which aided Lindy in doing so.

"I am honored to meet your acquaintance and would like to thank you in providing assistance." Lindy gave a friendly smile to the shorter blonde, "And it's nice to see that you've been alive all this time. As you probably gathered from the others, there's been some "issues" regarding your mother."

"Yeah, I heard" Alicia nodded with a frown, "And I'd rather not see her right now. At least not until I've had some time to get used to everything."

"I wasn't going to let you go anyways" Lindy affirmed understandably, "I plan on leaving for Mid-Childa tomorrow and deal with the fallout from this incident."

"What about Fate-chan and Arf-san?" Nanoha asked with concern, "Wasn't it because of this incident that they were allowed to stay here in the first place?"

"Correct, however since Precia was arrested, the Bureau's justice department wouldn't have much need to go after Fate and Arf as they were unwilling accomplices" The woman dismissed the concern away rather easily, "There is a slight chance they may be called as witnesses for the prosecution in a trial, but I'm going to make them work for it."

"How?" Sonic didn't miss that familiar look of mischief that graced the admiral's face.

"Aside from the crew that's flying the Arthra, I'm going alone." The woman explained her idea, "With the Arthra flying at a controlled speed, it'll take at least a day to get to Mid-Childa from this planet. And if either the prosecution or defense wants their testimony, they'll have to take the long flight to get here and back. Complicating matters more, this is a Non-Administrated World with little Bureau presence, so they'll have to use their own means of transportation."

"So it's a lot of running around." Sonic summed up the idea and couldn't help but chuckle in the genius, "Nice"

"It won't deter them, but it'll be a troublesome nuisance" Lindy noted, "I'll be leaving Chrono and Amy (Limietta) here to watch over things. Fate, Arf and Alicia can either stay here or with Nanoha's family if they don't mind an extra houseguest."

"I don't think my family will mind" Nanoha said thoughtfully, "We just had a sleepover with Arisa-chan and Suzuka-chan.

"And I really want to spend more time with Fate-chan and Alicia-chan too" The girl added with cheerful delight as she sent the aforementioned two a cute, friendly expression, "So I'm open to the idea of them staying too."

Arf and Sonic both hide their amusement at the matching expressions that Fate and Alicia had after the brunette's seemingly innocent statement, which, if taken in another context, could've been seen quite romantically. Lindy was amused; but still felt that the brunette probably should be more aware of what she was saying.

At any rate, with her plan set, the admiral dismissed the 5 to enjoy the rest of the day. She wanted to make sure the Arthra was set for the trip home among other things and she didn't with to trouble the kids more than she needed to. Among the arrangements and assurances she needed was with Nanoha's family and making sure they wouldn't mind taking in Fate and Alicia while she was gone. She had confidence though and knew that Nanoha and Sonic would be able to vouch for them.

The rest of the day was spent in peace and Sonic was given arguably the best birthday party he ever had. There were no presents to be exchanged or even a need for them. Just the simple time spent with friends was good enough for the blue hero.

* * *

><p><strong>[The next day]<br>[No BGM]**

It was a silent and rather peaceful sendoff that greeted Lindy Harlaown as she waved goodbye before setting off for Mid-Childa. Her confidence was well placed as the Takamachi family easily agreed to take care of the Testarossa siblings while she was away at work. While it was a relief, there were still far more serious matters that required her thoughts.

There was one question that stood out to the teal-haired admiral as she sat in the captain's chair of her ship. One question that would plague her mind for the rest of the flight over and even when she landed. It was a gravely serious manner and it could very well have just as serious ramifications. What was this question, one might ask? It was quite simple.

'_How do I tell Precia that her biological daughter has been found?'_

**[To Be Continued!]**

* * *

><p><strong>[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]<strong>

**[End of Chapter 22]**

Author's Notes: Shorter chapter, yes with a few less scenes. But pressed for time as it is and I needed to get something out. At any rate, I recovered with this lovely little cliffy!


	23. Chapter 23

SonicANIME2010 here, bringing in another chapter to Lyrical Familiar; I will have another chapter after this, then a bit of a hiatus to focus on my other two stories. I apologize for the long delay; I've been swarmed up by school work and heck this chapter is much shorter than I wanted it to be.

* * *

><p><strong>[Earth: Japan]<br>[Uminari City, Residential District]  
>[Takamachi Residence]<br>[Local Time: 0715 hours]  
>[BGM: "Welcome to our Town" Final Fantasy IV OST]<strong>

"Ittekimasu" Nanoha cheerfully said to her family and recent houseguests as she exited the front door to head for school.

"Itterasshai" Her family, including Sonic and the recent houseguests Fate, Alicia and Arf, said to the 9 year old as they watched her depart.

Even with the Admiral's departure less than an hour prior, it still didn't change the fact that Nanoha was still an elementary school student, and as the semester was still in session, she still had to attend school. There was little doubt that Fate and Alicia would have to join her at some point if their stay on Earth was to be of any lengthy of duration; but until they were sure. Nanoha's family wasn't about to chance that until they knew for sure.

As soon as Nanoha had left, Kyouya, Shiro and Momoko took their leave to start work at the café, leaving Miyuki to discuss things with Sonic and the others from Mid-Childa. The notable absence was of the Tutorial Ferret, as he had to accompany Lindy to Mid-Childa; the Jewel Seeds were his responsibility and he had to see to it that they were documented and safely stored.

"Alright, everyone" Miyuki said to Sonic, Arf, Alicia and Fate, who had just finished their breakfast, "With Nanoha-chan at school and everyone else at work, we are off to the dojo."

"Eh?" Fate was slightly confused; understandable as she had little idea what went on in the daily life of her new friend, "Why?"

"Training" the brunette answered easily and swiftly, "Go grab some gym clothes; the dojo's out back."

Arf and Alicia were equally confused but when they saw Sonic vacate his spot from the table, all 3 took the hint to follow suit. With little delay they met up with the hedgehog and made for the dojo in the back of the house.

* * *

><p><strong>[OP: "Innocent Starter" Mizuki Nana]<strong>

**Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar  
>Chapter 23<br>Complexities and Uncertainties**

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence: Dojo]<br>[Local Time: 0721 hours]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The trio from Mid-Childa met up with Sonic and Miyuki outside the dojo. All of them, aside from Sonic, who had opted to simply wear his gloves and shoes, had all worn some form of track or gym clothes. Fate and Arf both had light track suits on while Alicia had to wear an older pair of Nanoha's gym clothes as she didn't have any herself. That was a small issue that probably would be easily resolved with a shopping trip, something that Sonic would dread no doubt in the near future.

"Sonic's the one getting most of the training. We're teaching him our style to make him a solid close combat guardian for Nanoha-chan" Miyuki explained briefly as she led the others inside and quickly grabbed pairs of twin training blades for herself and Sonic, "Yuuno-kun was doing all of his training from the magical side, but since he's not here…."

"Someone will need to step in" Fate finished the trailed-off statement made by the eldest daughter of the Takamachi family. In truth, she wouldn't mind the idea of assisting as it would help her own training and get a chance for her to know her new friend's familiar and family, which would help her in getting to know Nanoha as a friend.

"Well, our last session, Tutorial Ferret pretty much stated that he didn't have much left to teach me in the way of spells" Sonic shrugged, "So it's just a matter of practicing them. But we rarely train magically here. Nanoha's family won't like if the dojo gets blasted up."

"However, we can work on close combat" Miyuki pointed out the object of training in the dojo as she set down her training blades and went to the wall to fetch some more for the Testarossa siblings, "Alright, what do you two wield for your magic device things?"

"Bardiche is a poleax" Fate answered almost instantly, prepared or not, she understood the training environment the dojo made.

"I don't use weapons" Arf admitted, "My fists and claws do my fighting for me."

"Lucky Star has 2 modes. Twin pistols for shooting and a paper fan for melee." Alicia answered just as truthfully, though quickly put a pouting look on her face when Miyuki gave her a deadpan look, "Don't look at me like that! I'm a mage, I can make it work."

"Okay… well since we don't have a shooting range, you'll just have to settle with practicing melee." Miyuki said rather neutrally, schooling her expression of exasperation from hearing that a powerful mage would use a paper fan for close range. She tossed the Testarossa siblings wooden practice blades, the longer one going to Fate to simulate using Bardiche while Alicia got the shorter for the paper fan.

"Alright" Miyuki said as she readied herself and gestured for Sonic to do the same, "Sonic-kun and I will have a practice spar to show what we're doing, then for the rest of the time we'll have 1-on-1 sparring while trading off partners."

The girls plus wolf from Mid-Childa all nodded their heads to confirm their agreement to the elder Takamachi sister's planning. They both watched as Sonic and Miyuki took battle stances at opposite ends of one another with their wooden blades readied to strike. As was the case before, Sonic had his blades held like he held the kodachi in his barrier jacket, his main hand held in a normal grip while the offhand held in a reverse grip. Miyuki had adopted a similar format only her offhanded grip was a normal one. While the differences in stances were notable, the effects they would've made didn't seem to be that important until they came to blows.

* * *

><p><strong>[Sonic vs Miyuki]<br>[BGM: "Normal Battle" Final Fantasy IV (arrangement)]**

Using his speed, Sonic was the first to make a move with a solid paced rush with both blades held at his side to build momentum in his stride. He was aiming to make an upward slicing attack to make up for the significant size disadvantage he had with his mentor and trainer. He had managed to close the distance into a sizable melee range before his mentor made her move.

Miyuki, to the noticeable surprise from the 3 onlookers, kept a calm composure and only made a subtle shift in her stance to a defensive minded one. Her off-hand held wooden blade easily intercepted both of the blue hedgehog's as they were going upward. Her block had not only broken up her pupil's attack, but also allowed her to make a spin in the same direction she had subtly shifted in before defending. To no surprise as she moved notably slow, Sonic was able to dodge backward with an agile flip.

The older teen moved in to make her move with a downward strike with her right hand blade. She had opted for such a strike not just to reach her significantly shorter pupil, but also to give her momentum to work with and keep her aggressive stride going. She was not surprised when her student dodged and moved to counter; rather she seemed to be expecting a movement of such as she was able to deflect the off-handed blade counter with her main hand blade. For the next few seconds to almost a half a minute, the hedgehog and human traded wooden blows and blocks with such blows.

The fact that Miyuki was not only able to keep up with the blue hedgehog's speed and also answer for his attacks had a significant reaction from Fate and Arf in particular. As they had spent a majority of their time on Earth hunting Jewel Seeds and acting as a de factor "rival" for Nanoha and her familiar, they entertained some thoughts of going after their rival to claim the Jewel Seeds. They had shot down such thoughts on several bases such as the fact that they had no idea where the two had lived and had no idea what their family was capable of.

As was most of the times when hindsight can prove to be 20-20, this was especially true as they were thankful that they shot down the possible strategy. Sure their magic might've helped them, but as Miyuki has shown so far in her spar with the hedgehog, she was formidable of a foe in close quarters combat and even with magic to help Fate and Arf; they would've been likely outclassed and put in their place quite swiftly enough.

"_Amazing..." _was Fate's only word to open a mindspeak conversation with her familiar. _"Arf, are you watching this?"_

"_Yeah" _The wolf girl answered, her jaw nearly slack in shock, _"If this is what just what one of the girl's family was capable of…"_

"_Fate? Arf?" _Alicia's voice cut in to reveal that she had been listening in, and was slightly confused by the musing of her younger, even if cloned, sister and her familiar in the mental conversation, _"What do you mean?"_

"_You remember when we told you about the Jewel Seeds?" _Arf asked the shorter blonde.

"_Yeah, you said that the incident had you and Nanoha-san as rivals in capturing them" _Alicia visibly nodded to confirm her agreement and memory.

"_Well while were hunting for the seeds, the fact that our rivals had Jewels of her own had not escaped our notice and we could've gone after our rivals for the seeds they had ourselves" _Fate explained, her tone did not hide the shame she felt in entertaining such mean and dishonorable thoughts, not to mention her regret, _"We quickly shot it down though because we not only had no knowledge of where our rivals lived, but even if we did, we had no knowledge of the support they had outside of their civilian friends."_

"_And you're glad you didn't move forward with it?" _Alicia finished off the train of thought with a knowledgeable conclusion. Nodding herself when she saw the latter two nod their head to confirm, _"Consider this too, she's still holding back..."_

"Earth to the Testarossa girlies" Sonic cut into the drawn out conversation. While he most likely was not listening in, it didn't take a genius to figure out that the girls were analyzing his instructor, "We're finished"

"Eh?!" The trio blinked and focused their attention on the duo that had recently sparred. They saw the amusement that was shared between the hedgehog and teen and realized that they had spent a longer time in their chat than they had thought and it might've made them look a "little" silly.

Sonic and Miyuki both enjoyed the humorous display of the trio of two girls plus wolf familiar adopt similar expressions of embarrassment and cute pink blushes to match. The display was about equal parts adorable and funny, but while Sonic would've liked his amusement to continue, he and Miyuki both quickly agreed that it would be best to save them from further embarrassment.

"Alright, let's get on to the 1-on-1 spars." Miyuki declared, "I'll take Fate-chan first, Sonic-kun will partner up with Alicia-chan."

"Hai" The aforementioned three nodded in agreement.

"Arf-san, would you mind watching more?" the girl asked the wolf familiar, "I'd like to keep this session to be weapon-based for now, later on we can likely focus on hand-to-hand combat."

"Sure thing" the wolf-girl shrugged. Sure, she was hopeful for a chance to spar with her opposite number in the familiar context and settle a thing or two with the friendly rival; she still felt that she should honor the request of the instructor.

* * *

><p><strong>[Public Seishou Auxiliary Elementary School]<br>[Grade, Class 1]  
>[Local time: 1200 hours]<br>[No BGM]**

Meanwhile, it was business as usual for Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka at the elementary school. Nanoha's biggest challenge since returning from the Arthra and aiding in the Jewel Seed incident was catching up on the work that she had missed. Not that she had no confidence in her friends' ability to take notes on what she had missed and do so effectively, but she had usually gotten better grades than Arisa and Suzuka for a reason. Not to take anything away from the two as they were exceptionally hardworking kids in balancing elementary school with cram and their music lessons, but the curriculum could be very challenging if they weren't paying as much attention to it. Luckily, Nanoha was able to return and catch up quite quickly even if it came at the cost of a few grade points.

"We don't have music or cram lessons today" Suzuka noted to Arisa and Nanoha during their break between classes set for the students to enjoy lunch, whether brought from the cafeteria or home, "Why don't we go somewhere to study and play?"

"I like that idea" Nanoha answered with a smile, "But whose house?"

"I vote for Nanoha's" Arisa's response was rapid, but didn't surprise Suzuka in the least.

"You really want to spend time with Fate-san and Arf-san," the purple-head said with little surprise in her voice, "Don't you?"

"Maybe…" the dirty blonde girl did not decline the statement, noteworthy enough, "I just wanna make sure they pass my inspection"

"And the new girl we saw earlier?" Suzuka didn't need her friend's reaction to tell that she was right. Suzuka herself was quite curious about Alicia and glanced at Nanoha with such an expression, "Alicia-san, right? What was her story?"

"Well... she's related to Fate-chan." Nanoha was able to say that much but couldn't find any other words for the rest so she opted for an attempted out, "But it's kinda complicated"

"Complicated, huh…." The girl said in a cryptic and, quite honest for Nanoha and Suzuka, frightening manner as heaven only knew where Arisa's usual paths of thought led her and sure enough, she asked from out of proverbial left field, "Wait, we're allowed to hear this right? We're not going to be ambushed or something by weird guys in tuxedos and sunglasses with some weird pen devices that wipe memories or something, right?"

"Ah… ah..." Nanoha tried, keyword "tried" to maintain a straight face in reaction to that question, but she was still taken by surprise by the sheer ridiculousness of the question. She tried to level a deadpan or flat look at her dirty blonde friend but ended up looking more cute than annoyed, much to the amusement of Suzuka.

"I think we're in the wrong country for that to be possible" the purple-head saved Nanoha of something awkward with her counter. She was quite amused, nonetheless, of the reaction Nanoha had to the question.

"Mou…" like the tsunderes are capable of, Arisa pulled off a cute, but meaningful pout, "Ruin my fun."

The rest of the school day went off with little issue or any dramatic hilarity of note happening, the drama was likely to be saved for when the trio returned to the café and meet up with Alicia, Fate and Arf.

* * *

><p><strong>[Takamachi Residence]<br>[Local time: 1825 hours (appx 6:25 pm)]  
>[BGM: "Welcome to our Town" Final Fantasy IV (arrangement)]<strong>

Farin and Noel, the maids from Suzuka's family, had taken the liberty to transport the trio of schoolgirls from Seishou to the Midori-ya. While Nanoha was humble enough to make her best resistance from being treated so importantly over her friends, she bowed at the insistence from the younger maid, Farin. In addition, she had taken the opportunity in the drive home to phone the Harlaown residence to get Chrono and Amy over to, A: make sure that her friends and family were allowed to hear about the specifics from the most recent case from Little Planet and B: disclose such specifics.

It took a little debate between the resident enforcer and information specialist. Chrono had argued that the case was, first and foremost, and wasn't even officially documented to the Bureau yet and should be kept from the civilians and Amy (Limietta) argued that Nanoha's friends and family already knew so much about their magic and knee deep in the first case, plus they had every right to know if the aforementioned Alicia, Arf and Fate were likely staying on Earth for the long term through the legal proceedings involving Precia, which was likely due to the lack of any next of kin. The last note was also the clincher for the brunette as she had argued for sympathy considering Fate and Alicia especially would need a presence of family to comfort them to help through any troubles they'd likely have in the long run, which had Chrono relenting in record time.

The trio from school had arrived at the café shortly prior to Amy and Chrono's arrival at around 1600 hours. The disclosure of vital information had to wait until closing time at the café to avoid any more civilians from accidentally overhearing anything they might not understand. To compensate Amy and Chrono for the trouble, Momoko had fixed up dinner for everyone, which would ease any dramatic tension generated from the sensitive information being disclosed.

The disclosure wasn't even a full one though at that, as Chrono had to avoid drawing any absolutes and that Precia wasn't tried just yet, nor did he disclose the fact that Fate was Alicia's "clone", which would've drawn a fair amount of questions that neither he nor Amy could answer. He was, however, able to clear up the conclusion of Alicia's identity. He had identified her as the older sibling to Fate, which, while odd for an older sister to appear younger than the latter, it wasn't unheard of. Amy also noted the conjecture of late bloomers to make it more believable.

Amy and Chrono had agreed to request that Nanoha's family aid in taking care of the Testarossa siblings, stating that their mother was in a bit of complex legal trouble and as there were no next of kin recorded to be available, it was either that or foster care or child services, which would add a lot of unnecessary complexities.

Nanoha's family had agreed quickly enough and offered to sponsor the girls enrolling in Seishou, the school their youngest daughter attended with her friends. They'd take care of any expenses as well in the meantime, which Chrono had promised to reimburse them for such. The Bureau would've likely had to anyway, considering the family situation involving the Testarossa family and the fact that Alicia and Fate were still technically minors.

With all said and done, Chrono and Amy had left the residence with full stomachs and calmed spirits. The complicated disclosure had gone better than they had anticipated, helped by the fact that any complex topics were avoided. They were still hopeful that Lindy didn't have to take too long on Mid-Childa.

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time: 2225 Zulu]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

Lindy reclined back in her comfortable chair in her spacey office on board the Arthra. She had spent a majority of the inflight time in boredom, but she was able to entertain herself and the young archeologist Yuuno with a few card and board games that led to one-sided results. The admiral had beaten out the archeologist boy in poker easy enough with the expert of poker faces; had beaten in him in chess, though that one was an interesting duel of minds regardless and could've gone either way.

"Nervous?" Lindy asked the boy

"A little" the sandy haired boy admitted, "I don't know how my reports on the Jewel Seed incident will be taken. It was mostly my fault for losing the Seeds and they led to almost dangerous results."

"Accidents happen" the admiral said quite quickly in retort, "I wouldn't worry too much. You had no way of knowing that your ship carrying the Seeds would've had an accident like it did. You knew the Jewel Seeds could potentially be dangerous and beyond your own power to keep in check so you enlisted the aid of someone you could trust. Keep in mind that pretty much anyone who you're reporting to likely have been in your shoes before. You made instinct-based decisions that ultimately led to the resolving of a dangerous incident before it got worse."

"What about you?" Yuuno asked, "I mean, with the liberties you took to make sure that Fate, Arf and Alicia aren't on Mid-Childa, you played the higher ups in a way"

"I'm not worried, this isn't the first time I've done things like that" The admiral calmly stated as she sipped from a mug of tea, which had her missing Amy's brews already, "The higher ups know as much, and they know that they were no better in some of the liberties they've taken. Like I also said, my decisions were instinct-based, there was no way I was going to let Fate, Alicia and Arf be caught up in the complex systems the Bureau has for minors at risk of being orphaned. I trust Nanoha-san's family more than the system.

"The higher ups know how complicated it can be though" Lindy noted, "And if Nanoha-san's family can prove that they can support them, it should be enough. And if not, I'll step in and adopt the children myself if I have to. There will be more pressure on the Bureau to ensure that the girls get what they need while their mother's facing trial."

"Speaking of…" the boy said on that note, "Have you thought about… um… you know"

"How I'm going to basically drop a volatile bombshell on an emotionally compromised woman?" Lindy finished rather bluntly with her expression matching. She softened up though with a defeated sigh upon seeing the boy nod with some recoil, "I honestly don't know yet… I can't come in too hard or blunt or Precia might break. I also can't be too soft as Precia might think I'm avoiding the issue."

"I wish I can help you there..." the boy noted with some regret.

"Don't worry" the woman assured him, "This is my battle to combat. You just have to worry about making your report and case regarding the Jewel Seed incident."

"Yes, ma'am" The boy stood up and saluted her.

"Don't "ma'am" me" Lindy chided playfully with an amused giggle, "I work for a living"

"Uh..." Yuuno felt rather stumped.

"I'm kidding" The woman waved dismissively, "You may rest for the evening if you wish; we'll likely hit Mid-Childa by mid-morning at the earliest."

"Thank you" The boy saluted once more before taking his leave.

'_Regardless of my fun and humor, there's still the manner of dealing with Precia...'_ Lindy thought to herself, _'How am I going to break the news to her?'_

* * *

><p><strong>[To be continued]<strong>

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

**[End of Chapter 23]**

Author's notes: Finally... a completion again... short or not, I needed this to get my momentum in the story again. Read, review, comment, etc, I'd like some opinions and feedback. Until then, later. Btw, before anyone asks, Zulu time is basically a "shared" time zone for the military, I opted for it regarding scenes with the Bureau to establish a difference between times in say Japan and Mid-Childa. Oh, a little reference to a movie or two here, pay attention, or you might miss them.


	24. Chapter 24

SonicANIME2010 here with, ideally, the last update to Lyrical Familiar for a little while, much as I like how this story is going and how fun it is to write this, I realize that I still have to focus on my other two stories. That said, I will put this one on a brief hiatus effective after this chapter post. This will allow me to focus on my other two stories, Sonic: Knight of the Night Sky and Sonic Adventure: Lyrical Record. Without any other delay, here we go!

* * *

><p><strong>[Dimensional Space]<br>[Time-Space Administration L-class Dimensional Cruise Vessel "Asura"]  
>[Time: 0855 Zulu]<strong>

It wasn't as if there was much choice in the matter that found one child archeologist and older admiral in the same room sharing a cup of tea. The subtle roar of the spaceship's engines combined with the standard issue bedding in the sleeping quarters being designed more for function rather than comfort, mixed for a tough night's rest. The only consolation for Yuuno was at least that Lindy was able to brew her own tea and it tasted plenty better than what the mess hall would've served.

"I'm guessing you had just about as much sleep as I did" Lindy casually said to the younger boy, "Perhaps a little more as I was had things to think about when I dismissed you."

"Yeah" The boy admitted in a little bit of guilt, "Hard to sleep when you have something on your mind."

"Still thinking about how your report on the Jewel Seeds will be taken?" Lindy asked, though she knew the answer. She gave the boy an understanding and comforting smile upon seeing him nod in response, "It'll be fine. As far as the higher ups in the Bureau are concerned, a suspect is in custody and standing trial for her actions involving the Jewel Seeds"

"But if I hadn't lost the Jewel Seeds, they wouldn't have gotten into her hands." Yuuno noted still in some amount of guilt.

"You can hardly be held responsible for an accident occurring." The woman countered, "The higher ups would be more inclined to commend you for enlisting a local who became a key driving factor in recovering the Jewel Seeds before they could be used for more harm."

"There is that..." Yuuno admitted and held no counter to the woman's statement at the current time.

"For the time being, we should focus on what we're going to do when we arrive on Mid-Childa" The woman noted, "You know where you're filing that report on the Jewel Seeds, correct?"

"Yes" the boy nodded, "I have filed progress reports on the findings I get from archeological digs before."

"Good" The admiral nodded in satisfaction, "I will accompany you for as long as I don't get dragged off to some meeting or summoning."

"Forgive me for saying this Admiral" the boy noted timidly the woman's choice of wording, "But you almost make it sound like you're expecting that to happen."

"In my experience, you learn to expect things to happen and prepare for them" Lindy said casually with a sip of her tea, "Anticipate actions before they occur, and you might find it rewarding."

"I will keep that in mind" the boy nodded.

"Good..." The admiral was about to say something else when an alert on her computer screen popped up. The woman allowed a small smile to grace her lips as she read the message, "Looks like we'll be arriving on Mid-Childa in less than 3 hours. You better get your things ready"

"Will do" Yuuno nodded, stood up and promptly excused himself after saluting the admiral once more.

Lindy found herself sighing the minute the boy had left her office quarters. Though she would say that she had plenty of time to lend a helping hand to anyone, she still had her own thoughts to lose sleep over. Like it was the case before, Precia Testarossa and the thought of having to break the news of Alicia being found alive to said woman was still fresh on her mind.

**[Opening: "Innocent Starter" Nana Mizuki]**

* * *

><p><strong>Sonic the Hedgehog: Lyrical Familiar<br>Chapter 24  
>Revelations and Aftershocks<strong>

* * *

><p><strong>[Non-Administrated Planet #97 "Earth"]<br>[Uminari City, Japan]  
>[Residential District: Takamachi Residence]<br>[Local Time: 0845 am]  
>[BGM: "Welcome to our town" Final Fantasy IV OST]<strong>

It was still somewhat early into the weekend morning when the members of the Takamachi family, plus their three temporary houseguests, settled down for a nice breakfast together. Nanoha, Fate, Alicia, along with Sonic and Arf, were already dressed up in casual, civil clothing designed for the spring, almost summer weather. And, in an almost comical manner, the aforementioned mages plus familiars were trying to eat said breakfast in a hurry.

"Settle down" Momoko chided softly, her face bearing an expression of amusement, "Your breakfast won't go anywhere."

"But, Arisa-chan and Suzuka-chan are going to be waiting for us" Nanoha tried to counter; though she had a feeling her mother wouldn't have any of it.

"I'm sure they'll be patient too." Momoko countered with that and another point, "Besides, don't you have one more party to wait on?"

"Oh yeah" Nanoha's memory was jogged in a second; though she didn't forget, some points require reminders, "Chrono-kun and Amy-chan."

The girl and her mother were referring to a shopping trip planned for this day. Since there was little doubt that Fate, Arf and Alicia were going to have a prolonged stay on Earth until the trial with Precia was over, Nanoha's family had taken it to themselves to help get the girls prepared for the long stay. What was among the things to get dealt with after aside from a school transfer? You guessed it, clothes shopping.

Arisa and Suzuka were more than willing to join their new friends in shopping while Amy Limietta and Chrono Harlaown were tagging along to supervise. Though the maids for the Tsukimura household were also coming along, they were also providing the transportation.

If the plan was to be followed to the letter, Arisa and Suzuka would arrive in a van driven by Noel at the top of the hour. From there, they would pick up Chrono and Amy before finally heading off to the shopping mall. Though, as it would sometimes happen, certain people may be "fashionably late" to the rendezvous.

Just about everyone was excited for the trip. The exceptions were easily understood; Sonic and Chrono had about the same amount of excitement; or more appropriately, discomfort for the trip. After all, they were the only guys on a shopping trip for girls, but they were going to endure it.

Breakfast was eaten in a proper, slow order after that, and they had all cleaned up after themselves. Once the dishes were all cleaned, the shopping trip party put on their shoes and, almost in a timely matter, a familiar horn sounded from outside.

"We're off!" Nanoha announced to her family as she and the others went outside to where the large van, with Noel and Farin standing near the open front seat doors waving, was parked and waiting for them.

"Have fun!" Momoko calmly saw her daughter and houseguests depart, "Be safe and call when you're on the way home!"

With a final wave and bowing gesture of departure, the group went into the van and it departed for the start of the adventurous, and interesting, day.

* * *

><p><strong>[TSAB Administrated Planet #1 "Mid-Childa"]<br>[Cranagan, Central Mid-Childa]  
>[Central-Mid Courthouse: Judge Chambers]<br>[Time: 1105 Zulu]  
>[BGM: "Baron Castle" Final Fantasy IV]<strong>

Lindy and Yuuno had arrived on Mid-Childa in little less than an hour ago and, sure enough, the admiral had barely been able to escort the child archeologist several feet towards their destination before they were intercepted by Admiral Leti Lowran. Lindy had barely been surprised as they had reported in upon arrival; it was only a matter of what the purpose of the interception was for.

Lindy had anticipated having to file a report on the recent case, especially considering the tricky tactics she utilized to keep Fate from being taken, but she had hardly expected to be summoned to an emergency meeting in a judge's chambers. Leti, for her part, had no idea why either. She was just told to fetch her counterpart from the Asura and take her to the courthouse.

Upon entering the room, Lindy was greeted to the sight of two lawyers seated before a desk. The lawyers appeared to be likely in their mid-30s or early-40s, while the judge was a woman in her late-50s to early-60s. It was obvious to the admiral that both lawyers and the judge were from the TSAB's JAG core. That much didn't surprise her; rather it would've been more surprising if they weren't handling it.

"Admiral Lindy Harlaown" Lindy announced herself formally with a salute

"At ease" the judge waved off the polite gesture and went straight to business, "You know why you're here?"

"Either it has something to do with the report I sent in prior to my arrival or my move to keep Fate Testarossa from coming to Mid with her mother" the woman answered quickly, as if she had anticipating the question. She took in the fact that neither judge nor lawyer gave her any looks after the latter was said before she continued on, "Am I to assume it is because of the former?"

"Yes; if anything you did the Bureau a favor by keeping the girl on that planet" The judge replied, "Given what has already been stated in the reports, she would've been far too volatile as a witness for either side. And, from what we can draw from your report, her help was needed.

"But, I didn't call for this emergency meeting to commend you. This is about who you encountered on that recent mission" The judge motioned to a picture of Alicia Testarossa as she appeared during the adventure on Little Planet, "Are you absolutely certain of this girl's identity?"

"Yes. I had taken a recent sample of her DNA and compared it against reportedly missing children in the past." Lindy opened the folder containing her full report and reorganized the papers about until the most important document would've been the first read. She handed it to the judge with a serious expression, "They're a perfect match. This girl is Alicia Testarossa"

"By kami..." the judge, along with both lawyers, had to pause to compose themselves after getting a proverbial bombshell dropped on them with the revelation.

"I don't understand how that is possible." One of the lawyers pointed to the picture, "The accident that led to her disappearance happened over 25 years ago, and this girl doesn't even look like she's aged a bit since."

"I can guess that she was taken from Mid as the explosion went off by Little Planet. The satellite object that had become Alicia's temporary home." Lindy offered, "We don't know anything else about it at this time, and it disappeared before we can learn from it."

"I see… there's not much to do then." The judge closed the folder before glancing at the admiral once more, "I assume you'll break this news to Testarossa?"

"I'll have to, we can't keep this secret from her" the woman answered back, "I'll need some time alone with her though, as I talked with her a few times prior to her official booking. I think the news will be best to come from me."

"Then you'll have as much time as you need" the judge nodded, "As of right now, this trial; if I can even call it that is at a halt."

"What?!" Lindy was shocked, enough so that she had to take a moment to regain her composure, "Nothing's happened since she was booked?"

"Apparently there's a lot of high-profile interest in this case from some of the politically minded higher-ups in the Bureau" the judge had a visibly annoyed expression on her face, "And they keep sending the attorneys, and myself, mixed messages. Until everyone's on the same page, I've put the trial on hold."

"Lovely" the admiral did not hold back her sarcasm in that statement, "Just what this case needs; a political mess."

"It is what it is." The judge said as she stood up, which also got the two attorneys to stand up as well, "This concludes the meeting. You are all dismissed"

"Yes, ma'am!" the admiral and attorneys saluted almost in sync and took their leaves with troubled thoughts and confusion.

'_Now for the fun part'_ Lindy thought to herself as she followed both attorneys to where Precia was kept.

**[Non-Administrated Planet #97 "Earth"]  
>[Uminari City, Japan]<br>[Downtown: Shopping Mall]  
>[Local Time: 1205 am]<br>[BGM: "Welcome to our town" Final Fantasy IV OST]**

The group had arrived at the mall at around the time for the department stores to open up for business. This was mainly done so they could get a good parking spot for the van. After all, the weekends were when the malls would find the most traffic and the parking spots, while free, came at a premium given how many people shop on the weekends.

The first part of the shopping trip started innocent enough with a department store that carried well-known brands tailored for girls and boys under the age of 10. While Alicia had quite the length of time since her last shopping escapade, she adapted quickly and was soon dragging her younger sister/clone off to try on shirts and skirts. It was cute, especially as Fate, who was normally shy and timid, had a cute blush on her face when she saw how cute she and her sister looked in the outfits.

The final decisions for both girls had, to much the surprise of the others, been quite different. Fate had found a likeness in the black and yellow themed outfits, which Nanoha, Sonic and Arf noted that likely carried on from the colors her Barrier Jacket and Bardiche were centered around. Alicia, on the other hand, had found her style in the sea-green, light blue and white outfits, and made sure she picked the tops and bottoms that had some frills to go with. There was no mistaking the energetic personality the shorter blonde had, which offset with her sister.

Arf also had the opportunity to pick up a few outfits for herself. Even though she was a shapeshifting wolf, she had quickly picked up a point that she would likely be spending more time under the human guise, at least until she had developed a shapeshift to assume a more suitable form for the planet. Her kind of wolf was not like the ones she had read about on this planet, so it was reasonable to believe that she would've drawn a few concerned looks. Even Arisa, who had a fondness for dogs, had agreed that Arf's natural form was a little too unusual and had opted to help her look for clothing to fit in. The wolf-girl had settled on a few simple pairs of jeans and shirts, simple and functional.

The innocence of the next part of the trip would've been widely up for debate; and it was the underwear shopping. The only boys of the trip had tried so hard not to focus too hard and avert their eyes, but a few of the girls were of the mischievous sort and wouldn't let them have it, namely Arisa and Amy Limietta.

A few times while Alicia was helping Fate and Arf with their undergarments, Arisa had tried on a few and playfully showed off to Sonic and Nanoha, visibly enjoying the blushing reactions she had received. Her fun had been cut short multiple times by the sensible Suzuka, thankfully. Unfortunately for Chrono, he had no such aid; Amy had found quite some enjoyment in trying on some of the more risqué garments just to mess with him. The only reason she had stopped was when the other girls were finished and waiting for them.

The group had opted to take a break for snacks and discussion before continuing on with their adventure. They had reached a pretty reasonable pausing point as their next destination would've been the electronics retail stores for phones and whatnot, and the food court was in the middle. Lunch was bought and a large table was where they gathered to eat and trade chat.

"So, how are you guys doing?" Amy opened up the field with a standard question, "Having fun?"

"Yeah" Alicia and Fate were the first to nod, the former was a little bit more expressive than the latter as she continued, "It's been a while since I last did this sort of thing, and it's really fun to see what gets my cute little sister happy."

"And I like to see Alicia happy too…" Fate softly added, the praise she had received from the aforementioned sister had elicited an adorable blush to her cheeks, "I've never done this before"

"I'm having a blast too!" Arf quickly chipped in rather energetically. It had been a bit of a surprise for Sonic and Nanoha to see an energetic side to the wolf-girl familiar, but they had found quickly that any serious side to her personality was quick to melt away when her mistress was happy and having fun, "I'd like to try this again if Fate's going too."

"Just don't spend too much" Chrono chided on a serious note, "We're operating on our own budget here."

"Mou, Chrono-kun, don't take all of the fun out of this" Amy Limietta sighed in exasperation over her co-worker becoming the killjoy, "Though he is right, the Bureau isn't going to pay for the expenses."

"Not to worry" Arisa chimed in joyfully, "I'm paying for them."

"But, Arisa-chan..." Nanoha tried to argue against, "You don't have to; it's not too much for my family…"

"Nope! You're not allowed to open your wallet today, Nanoha-chan!" the dirty-blonde countered right back, "I'm paying and that's final."

Fate and Alicia were equally surprised, but they had opted to not offer any arguments as the words of their new friend carried a tone of finality to them. With full stomachs and high spirits, the shopping trip continued.

* * *

><p><strong>[TSAB Administrated Planet #1 "Mid-Childa"]<br>[Cranagan, Central Mid-Childa]  
>[TSAB Mid-Childan Main Office]<br>[Time: 1235 hours Zulu]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

It was a silent trip back to the Main Office for Lindy and the JAG core attorneys for the Testarossa case. The former was still in deep in thought as to how to break the news to Precia about the recovery of her biological daughter, the latter were still in shock over how it was possible.

Just as the drive over was silent, so was the walk to an interrogation room, where Lindy had to wait outside with the prosecuting attorney. The defense, under privilege, had gone to fetch her client and talk to her briefly before letting Lindy in. It wasn't much of a wait, as the attorney had only given a brief update of the delayed case before informing her about the visitor.

Lindy was let in shortly after that as the defense attorney left the room, no doubt due to Precia requesting to talk with the guest alone once she found out who it was. The admiral wasn't quite sure what to expect of Precia's condition, but she was pleased to find that the woman had appeared to clean herself up a bit after she was booked.

"So, you've come to speak with me again" The older woman addressed the admiral with a neutral expression, "If it was anyone else, I might've had the lawyer stay, but I feel that I can trust you."

"Yes, I feel I should thank you though for that little suggestion you dropped when we last spoke" Lindy said as she neared the seat opposite of where Precia sat, "Fate was a great help in resolving a little incident on the planet the Asura was in orbit of."

"Good for her, she deserves better than me." The woman allowed some relief to show in her expression, though she had to greatly school it to keep the guilt she still felt away. Her efforts were quickly aided when she saw a vanilla folder in the grasp of the admiral, "But I don't believe that's why you are here."

"Indeed…" Lindy admitted with a soft sigh as she took her seat and set the folder out in front of the other woman, signaling for her to open it up, "It's about what, or should I say, who, we found during this incident that brought me here"

**[BGM: "Cry in Sorrow" Final Fantasy IV]**

If the older woman had any sense of foreboding, she didn't allow it to show on her face as she took the folder and opened it. Her expression fell flat in shock and her arms felt light, almost as if the sight had caused her to feel older. Right in front of her was the cause of the shift in emotion, one of the many shots of Alicia as she had appeared to aid in the liberation of Little Planet.

"Is this…" Precia found herself struggling to piece together her question, "Is she really…"

"Indeed she is…" Lindy confirmed the unfinished question with a solemn nod, "DNA confirms it; this is your daughter"

"Alicia…" the woman clenched the photograph tightly, tears slowly trailed from her face in an outburst of emotions, which, considering how good the woman was at schooling her features, made her state more obvious.

"Well then…I'll leave you be if you wish" Lindy had started to sit up to take her leave, but a firm grasp on her sleeve halted any further action. The admiral could only sigh when she saw the pain-stricken face of Precia stare right at hers and she got the message real clear, "Or I can stay."

"Please…" the woman weakly requested, "Tell me everything…"

"Several days ago, a dimensional disturbance happened over a lake on the planet that a majority of the Jewel Seeds had landed on. The source of the disturbance was a satellite-like object. It quickly fell under the siege of a mad scientist and his robotic creations hoping to utilize its power for conquest." Lindy started out with the incident occurring, "To liberate this land and send a message to this madman, I sent a small task force consisting of Fate, her familiar and their new friends, whom you'll recall were their "rivals" in the previous incident…"

"Yes... they had fought a few times, the girl in white had tried so hard to reach out to Fate" The woman nodded calmly, "I held a lot of respect for her determination and drive."

"Along the way, they had encountered Alicia; who was already working to drive the machines out of the land, claiming that it had been her home for a short amount of time" the admiral continued, "If I knew how your daughter ended up there, or how she barely appeared to have aged a year or so past the accident, I would've told you… but as of right now…"

"You don't know…" Precia finished the hanging statement, sighing when she drew a solemn nod from the admiral, "And I don't suppose you could investigate this Lost Logia further?"

"It disappeared shortly after it was liberated" The younger woman nodded, though she was quick to place a reassuring hand on Precia's shoulder, "But I doubt this will be the last time we see of it. According to the hedgehog, this asteroid, known to the locals as "Little Planet" will appear once every year and stay for one month's time before disappearing.

"Given time, I'm sure we'll get to the bottom of this" Lindy continued with a smile, "This I can assure you."

"Not like it matters… I know that Alicia is alive and well, and I am happy for that." A small smile graced the woman's features before a worried frown replaced it quickly enough, "How is she? Does she know about Fate? How is she taking her?"

"These should answer your questions" The admiral flipped over several pictures until she got to a string that showed Alicia energetically and lovingly doting on Fate like a sibling would, "She is… if I may paraphrase… overjoyed that she has a little sister to dote on and play with. The fact that Fate's an artificial mage and clone of her doesn't matter at all to her. She's happy to finally have a little sister and that her mother had not forgotten the promise."

"She remembered it too…" Precia hung her head lightly in regret; tears had rolled down her face once more, "Does she know about me?"

"She does, but she has told me that she is not ready to see you right now" Lindy regretfully had to break that sad truth to the older woman, "I believe that she doesn't quite know what to say and, until she does so; I'm afraid your reunion will have to wait."

"The fact that I'm facing serious charges will complicate that matter as well…" Precia hung her head low once more and her grip on the admiral's sleeve loosened, "Is this all?"

"Yes" Lindy nodded as she stood up to take her leave, "I'll leave you to your thoughts. I'll try to visit you in a few days if I'm still here."

The young admiral barely made it a few steps to the door before the older woman had called to her again in concern.

"Wait!" Precia gestured to the folder, "What about this?"

"Keep it" Lindy answered, "There are only pictures in that folder. Look through them all if you wish. I had managed to compile all of the shots I could that had Alicia with Fate and her new friends."

"Oh…" The older woman could only offer a parting greeting to the admiral as she watched her depart, "Thank you…"

The wave of a hand was the only sign that Precia could discern to indicate that the admiral had even heard the words of gratitude. If the woman were to focus her gaze longer on that door, she might've seen the younger admiral heave out a heavy sight or relief upon closing the door to the interrogation room.

'_That went better than I expected'_ Lindy thought to herself in relief as she departed, _'I'll have to check by her in a day or so when I get the chance...'_

* * *

><p><strong>[Non-Administrated Planet #97 "Earth"]<br>[Uminari City, Japan]  
>[Residential District: Takamachi Residence]<br>[Local Time: 2105 hours (9:05 pm)]  
>[No BGM]<strong>

The shopping trip came to a rather peaceful end well into the afternoon. Fate and Alicia had gotten matching phones, which, oddly enough, was the same model used by Nanoha. Phone plans were paid for by Chrono and Amy, as they had opted to take the responsibility for. Even though Fate and Alicia had spent more nights staying over at the Takamachi residence, they were still technically attached to the household of Lindy Harlaown for the time being.

The maids had dropped off Nanoha, Sonic, Fate, Alicia and Arf outside of the house shortly after dropping off Chrono and Amy at the Harlaown residence. Goodbyes were exchanged before the maids had taken Arisa and Suzuka back home to their respective houses.

They had all arrived shortly before Momoko had finished making dinner for everyone. And after enjoying said dinner and aiding with the dishes, the girls along with Sonic and Arf, quickly got ready for bed.

"I had a lot of fun today, Fate-chan, Alicia-chan" Nanoha said as she stood outside her bedroom door with Sonic already almost asleep in their shared bed. The brunette had wanted to say a few things before she joined her de facto little brother and familiar.

"Oh, me too" Fate nodded in agreement, though she was still shy, the efforts taken by everyone had slowly gotten her to get out of that shell.

"I would love to do it again!" Alicia chimed out beside her younger, but not shorter, sibling.

"Me too" Arf added; the girls could've pictured the wolf girl in her natural form wagging her tail in anticipation and excitement over the idea.

"I'm sure we can at some point..." Nanoha smiled cheerfully, "Until then, good night!"

"Good night!" the others chimed back.

And with that, another adventurous day came to a close. However, much like time goes on, so does a story. But for now, from a little home in Uminari City Japan, good night everyone.

**[Ending: "Little Wish ~Lyrical Step" Yukari Tamura]**

* * *

><p><strong>[End of Chapter 24]<strong>

Author's notes: Alright! That will do it for now. This story is officially going on a hiatus until I finish up the arcs for Lyrical Record and Knight of the Night Sky. This will give me the chance to fill my brain with possible ideas as to how to play out the A's arc. And also how to deal with Fate and Alicia and ultimately who adopts them. As of right now, I'm leaning between keeping it canon with Lindy, or putting them with the Takamachis, which would give Fate and Alicia a chance to get to know Nanoha a lot better. There's also the complexities surrounding Precia to deal with as well, so I've got a lot on my plate now and I need some time to sort it all out. Until then, my story updates will focus on the latter stories I've put off for far too long. See ya!


End file.
